The Son I Never Knew

I never held you in my arms,

never heard you cry,

never watched your little fingers

reach toward the sky.

But somewhere in the quiet

of the life that was chosen,

I wonder who you might have been,

and all the things I'd never lose.

Would you have had her eyes?

My smile upon your face?

Would you have loved the sound of rain,

or run toward every embrace?

I gave you a name inside my heart,

though no one else could hear.

And sometimes,
when the world is still,

I swear I feel you near.

There are no photographs to hold,

no birthday candles glowing,

no first steps down the hallway,

no way of ever knowing.

Only a thousand little questions

that will never have an end.

Who would you have grown into?

What would you have called me then.

I carry grief for someone,

I never got to know,

a love without a lifetime,

a seed that couldn't grow.

And though the years keep moving

and the world keeps turning on,

there will always be a quiet place

inside me for my son.

I cannot change what happened.

I cannot rewrite the past.

But the love I had for you

is a love that still can last.

So wherever you exist

in the mystery beyond,

know that you were thought of,

know that you were loved.

My son I never knew,

my almost, my what-if, my why--

you lived inside my heart for a moment,
and somehow,
You still do.