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I still can feel the pain
I still can feel the sorrow
I'm going to be there again
Odds are it will be tomorrow.
Warning without warning
Never heard from you again
Rules were made to be broken
I've broken my own heart instead.

So sad that you left me
Sadder still that you are gone
I should have put you on a pedestal
Are you still angry
Or are you calm?

I'll never kiss your cheek again
Never see your smiling face
Waiting for a box of letters
But the letters never came.
Too late to say much of anything
Unless I'm talking to the sky
It was important for you to know me
I just didn't understand why.

So sad that you left me
Sadder still that you are gone
I should have put you on a pedestal
Are you still angry
Or are you calm?

It's much too late for anything
So I'll close my eyes to sleep
Teach me the rules again
Tell me how my life should be.
I want to visit where I last saw you
But I know you won't be there
A cup of coffee where we once sat
I can cry, but there's no one to care.

So sad that you left me
Sadder still that you are gone
I should have put you on a pedestal
Are you still angry
Or are you calm?

Note added later:

I changed the title of this song to "A Box of Letters", in retrospect it seems more appropriate.

Excellent poem. I can relate to all of this. Thanks for sharing
Phil

Thank you Phil. I wrote this in memory of my dear friend Paula.

I would go long periods without hearing from Paula, then I would get a manilla envelope filled with months worth of letters. Paula would misplace my address but continue to write to me anyway. Then when she found the address she would send me the accumulated letters. I hadn't heard from her for eight years before she died, and as the years went on I wondered if one day I would get a box of letters since it had been so long.

But the letters never came.

One time I told her how I expected our friendship would end. I said that I wouldn't hear from her for a long time, then I would find out that she had died. She gave me the appropriate response, "Fuck you!"

She was laughing.

Unfortunately, that is what happened. One late night I was online and I put her name in the Social Security Death Index and found that Paula had died a year earlier.

I'm grateful that about a year after I found out (two years after her death) I had the opportunity to talk on the phone with a friend that I had only heard her mention. The friend told me that Paula was doing well before her death, and that her death had been an accident as the police had determined it to be. She also said that although Paula and I had not been in touch for a long time, she knew that Paula loved me. This makes me as sad as it makes me anything. I miss her so much and I will miss her forever.

First, your poem, and then your posting, took me many places I had no idea I'd be going. I was touched by your poem and moved by its explanation. Thank you for including me in your 502nd, John. I feel the same.


Love,
Lizzay

Thank you Lizzy. Your support for my writing means more than I can say. This song was actually written into an email that I sent to Shirley Spencer, who has been another great supporter of mine and who I'm grateful to as well.

It's great seeing Shirley Spencer's name here, too .


Love,
Lizzay

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Yes, very nicely done, John.

Hi John

A touching and poignant song. Thank you also for giving us the back story on this work. A very sad story. Good to know that Paula enjoyed some good times even near the end.

Chris