Time arrives uninvited,
bringing fear and too many questions.
It feels as if the love in your heart is cracking, splintering.

But before you crumble,
look up one more time.

There are still things reaching for you:
hope, strength, small impossible moments
that refuse to die quietly.

Grab onto them.
Clutch them like a lifeline.

Because fear is loud,
but it is not always right.

And sometimes love carries us
through one more night
than we thought we could survive.

-Mandy Ricks

This poem is for my daughter Samantha and her precious cat Pebbles. She has had Pebbles for sixteen years, since she was a child, and sadly today he is very sick.

We’re all hoping for the best and clutching onto all the love and hope we can.

-Mandy