Inhale me
breathe me
full of love
in our
rustic orange
dreams
in a dusty rose
forgetfulness
and a place
of forgotten
feelings
touch my soul
keep me there
quiet
perfect
and whole
© Kait King, 2015
Inhale me
breathe me
full of love
in our
rustic orange
dreams
in a dusty rose
forgetfulness
and a place
of forgotten
feelings
touch my soul
keep me there
quiet
perfect
and whole
© Kait King, 2015
I know I’ve never loved
anyone, anywhere
in any way even
close to the way
I love you
I’ve never hurt
anyone, anywhere
in any way
more than I’ve tortured
myself
about you
© Kait King, 2015
With some leftover tea
I chuck some painkillers at me
A certain kind of guilt and
a definitive disgust wash over me
I fight every day
to keep a smile on my face
being strong, overcome
I have a new life to embrace
I know this is not what
I signed up for
I’ve paid the full price
for so much more
But I guess some you win
and some you lose
So I experience my life
in a different pair of shoes
But I’m still so sure
I was destined for so much more
so much more
I’ve already paid for
© Kait King, 2015
Life suspended in a web-like hammock
the coffee smell not as nostril-curling as in the past
a homeless man stumbles along wet walks
dragging his sorry arse along the splinter lit street
a reflection a sad life in a hard city,
his city a place where he lost his wife and his job,
a home, his family
where he nearly took his own
when things were darker than ebony
and he had to walk his walk alone
A bunch of aggro school kids
too brash and way too loud
disrespect his foul figure on the skids
he had no room to be proud
He seeks a place that’s dry
it won’t be warm,
he knows a place where he can cry
and his aching tears won’t show
© Kait King, 2015

The day draws painfully long,
my love
without you in it
The night a torturous silence,
my love
when you are not in my bed
A meal for two,
my love
is now a punch in my gut
and I cannot eat a morsel
thank you,
my love
let me thank you for
a lesson learned
As I never would have believed,
my love
that I would never be
with you
© Kait King, 2017
That’s the last thing you wore
that held your warm body close
It was the last thing before
your heart and pressure slowed
A cloth got to finally hold you
something I never got to do
People say that it was better that way
But I don’t know if that’s quite true
I hold your once sweaty t-shirt
drenched now with my own tears
and try to inhale what’s left of you
As it fades from all the years
© Kait King, 2015
People experience loss in very different ways. People experience what they value differently too. Depending on what you are taught to value, is how you will experience that loss. If, when growing up, you are taught the difference between giving, taking and sharing we form a basis for understanding value. If you are taught to value money and possessions, that these things make you the person you are, things define you. What if you go bankrupt and lose everything – will you commit suicide? Money and success has represented you and your life.
But if money was not the valued commodity and family was – if you lost everything materialistic, wouldn’t your family or friends have the most important value to you, not your image of success? Family and friends are there when nothing and nobody else is…
How do you define yourself? What is really important to you? How do you represent yourself in the world?
Just food for thought….
I thought that I had fallen in love
and then I met you
I thought that I had felt true love
and then I met you
I thought that I had given my love
and then I met you
I thought that I had been in love
then I met you
I thought that I had lost love
and then I lost you
© Kait King, 2015
Does anyone else
ever feel
That this world
isn’t real?
That you know
you don’t belong
Perhaps the ‘Big Guy’
got it wrong
This is not
where you’re meant
to be
Running on the
hamster wheel –
trapped
and not free
Do you ever
think to yourself:
“I am the ostracized alien
I am the one
who doesn’t
fit in!”
And decide to make
a concerted effort
But remain
disappointed
So you retreat
and think,
“Fuck it”
© Kait King, 2016
It was so sad
to watch you fade
your mind
as sharp as a knife
It was so hard
to say goodbye
To such a treasured life
It made me smile
to think on you a while
and on how you loved
your wife
Your children given
all you had
you gave
a treasured life
It seems that you
are still here
although you can’t
be seen
I often talk to you
And not just
in my dreams
I hope I told you
I loved you enough
I hope you know
how much I cared
And I know
one day,
I’ll see you again
Somewhere over there…
© Kait King, 2015
You never quite got to be here
You never quite got to breathe in air
I never quite got to touch your face
take you home
show you your place
I never quite got to watch you grow
I never quite got to get to know
you, your love
I never quite got to hold your tiny hand
or do anything else that I had planned
I’ll never quite hear you say “Mum you were right!”
Or get to read bedtime stories at night
You’ll never quite miss me when I am not there
Sadly our lives, this time, we’ll not share…
© Kait King, 2015
Somehow you get through – it’s not even that you learn to live with these things – they stay in our lives forever as part of who we are. In fact these are the things that make us who we are. They used to say this kind of suffering was character building. That may or may not be so, for me, it allows great reflection and understanding of my capacity to love and give love and in turn what it means to lose that.
One of the annoying things friends and family expect, is for you to “get over it” after a certain amount of time – whatever that time is. But there is nothing to get over. You can’t just imagine it’s behind you – things are not behind us, they are all a part of us. We carry them with the sum of ourselves. Maybe by putting things behind us we let our guard down, we love too easily again, we get hurt so much more because of that. Taking the good and the bad experiences is what makes you the person you are. Are you a fighter? Do you run away? Are you persistent? Do you give up? Whatever you do, you have to live with it – you don’t learn to live with it – there is no manual. You have no choice, choice has been removed from this section of your life and a loss of some kind has left a crater and a giant rock in the same place. Luckily the giant rock plugs up a lot of the feelings for a while – this is often known as shock. Eventually the putridness of your trapped feelings in this hole in your heart starts building up a mass of toxic gasses which must be expelled. This build up, over any period of time (as long as it takes you), causes a massive explosion. The giant rock is blasted apart from the hole in your heart. The tiny splinters of angst, hurt, devotion, honor,disbelief, love and any other betrayed related feeling you can imagine, is dug deeply into your heart and mind. Each little splinter of that pain has barbs of doubt, guilt and confusion holding them in place in your heart. And we can’t let go or it can’t let go of us or we don’t give ourselves permission to keep moving forward even though we are cemented in that time of tragedy and know that’s impossible, isn’t it?
The hard part is learning to navigate around these losses, grievances and betrayals, eventually like a powerful river we keep flowing around these rocks of hurt that seem like they will never shift or move. But they do erode – the erosion is so subtle and slow we don’t even notice and so it is, I believe, with tragedy, loss and grief; be that for a living being or a relationship of any kind. Loss leaves a big hole and a giant rock that you drag around with you all the time. Afterwards we question everything said and done, what could have been different, the “if only’s” and the “what if’s” with hopeless, empty dreams. Nothing can be changed. It is what it is, but I know I fight against this too, even though I understand the futility of the fight!
I think only in time will I manage to erode down that rock of loss, will I be able to take the sharp edges off and flow a little easier around the things put in my way that I have no way of changing. Perhaps time won’t heal the wounds, but perhaps time allows my river of life to smooth the edges of hurt. Perhaps it lets me build up strength so that I can push past that hurt easier, every time I have to go past that hurt again. Because it doesn’t go away….
It’s not that I’ve forgotten you, sweet angel of mine, it’s that I just lost myself for a little while. You’ve been there so strong and true. Your arms swallow me safely and I’m grateful, so grateful for you. I couldn’t even see your pain because I couldn’t see through mine – the deep dark cloud of despair. I know it’s not forever, but at the moment, a day is a lifetime
For Jay, my nine year old son (at the time) who had to live with me being there, but not there, for nearly five years. I remember just about nothing of that period of time due to the heavy medication I was on. In the photo above he’s twenty 🙂