Short funeral poems

The light you left is still on here.

We see by it, and hold you near.

Missed at every table, every door,

loved today and evermore.

Gone ahead, but not away.

Home is where you are today.

We keep your laugh, we keep your ways,
we keep the lessons of your days.
And when we miss you, as we do,
we find a little more of you.

Look for me in the morning light,
in fields where the tall grass sways.
I did not go too far tonight;
I'm in the rest of your days.

She held our hands until we grew,
she held our hearts the whole way through.
Now we hold her memory near,
and feel her love still living here.

He never said much, but he stayed,
he fixed, he carried, and he paid.
The quiet ones leave gaps so wide.
We'll fill them, Dad, with you inside.

Safe now in the arms of grace,
we'll see again your smiling face.
Till then we'll live the way you showed,
and walk in love along the road.

You were the call I'd always make,
the one who'd drive, the one who'd stay,
the one who'd laugh at my mistake
and help me through it anyway.
The phone is quiet, friend, today.
But every time I need to find
the strength you gave, I know the way:
I have your voice inside my mind.

You told the stories, we sat near,
you told them over, year by year.
Now we will tell them, every one,
to our own children, when you're gone.
And they will ask, and we will say,
"That's how it was. That was the way."

Don't dress in gray on my account,
don't speak in whispers, low.
Tell stories that I told too loud,
and play the songs I know.
Then raise a glass, and laugh a while,
and when the evening's through,
remember that I loved you all,
and that you loved me too.

You waited at the door each night,
you knew my steps, my key.
The door is quiet now, old friend.
Thank you for waiting for me.