Loss

Her eyes had dulled, the life drained sadly away.

Her smile had disappeared; that it had existed at all had now become a mere rumour.

Her stance spoke of a broken woman, a woman who had thrown in the towel, given up the fight, relinquished her place, accepted defeat.

Her shoulders sloped so that you could almost watch her energy trickle down their length, drip off her fingers and vanish, unspent, into the ground.

Her head fell to one side naturally now, giving her a mournful yet slightly quizzical air, as though she were trying to fathom how she had come to be so.

Crowds passed her in the street. On their faces was the evidence of their thoughts:
"Poor cow - some people are so bloody miserable"; "Thank God I'm not like that"; "There, but for the Grace of God..."

Have you noticed that people seldom equate the old, infirm or unhappy with themselves? They seem to think they are exempt from these phenomena, naturally occurring and usually lurking somewhere around the corner for each of us...

To have loved and lost is a tragedy. To have loved and lost so many leaves only a shell.