Paul Rees - Civil Celebrant

31/03/2026

😔💜💜💜

This flower wasn’t meant to fall like this,
its stem bent into something unnatural,
resting on wood that doesn’t remember
the way your hands once held it upright.

I keep stopping in the middle of small moments,
like pouring coffee or opening a door,
because something in me forgets for a second
and expects you to still be there.

Then it comes back—quiet but sharp—
that space where your voice used to live,
and everything around me feels slightly off,
like a room rearranged without warning.

I thought disbelief would fade with time,
that reality would settle into something firm,
but it hasn’t—not really—
it just keeps returning in waves.

The world continues like it always does,
sunlight slipping through the same windows,
people speaking in the same rhythms,
but I keep pausing inside of it.

That pause has become its own kind of place,
where I stand alone for a moment each day,
holding the truth like something fragile
I’m still learning how to carry.

Even this fallen flower feels like a mirror,
something once alive now resting quietly,
and I find myself staring at it longer
than I know how to explain.

Because it’s not just that you’re gone—
it’s that my mind keeps reaching for you,
like a habit it hasn’t unlearned,
like a story that stopped too soon.

And I’m left here, pausing again,
trying to accept what still feels unreal,
trying to move forward through moments
that keep pulling me back.

—Angels Are Near

21/03/2026

💜💜💜

I stand where the water forgets the shore
where everything feels suspended, unfinished
the sky stretches wide above me
filled with quiet lights I cannot name

I wonder which one holds you
which distant flicker carries your knowing
if you see me standing here
small against all this open space

The surface beneath my feet barely moves
just enough to remind me I’m still here
just enough to mirror the sky
as if I’m caught between two worlds

I speak to you without sound
my thoughts rising like breath in cold air
hoping something of me reaches upward
the way your absence settles down into me

There’s a stillness I’ve grown used to
a kind of quiet that follows me everywhere
even in the middle of everything
I feel like I’m standing alone in this reflection

But I keep looking up anyway
because that’s where you feel closest
in the endless, scattered light
that never quite fades from view

And if you can see me from there
just know I haven’t stopped missing you
not in ways that break me open
but in ways that stay, constant and true

—Angels Are Near

20/03/2026

💔💔💔

If love alone
had the power to rewrite fate,

you would still be here
filling the quiet rooms
with your laughter.

Every memory
every tear
every whispered prayer
would have been enough
to pull you back to life.

But love sometimes
has to learn the hardest truth—

that even the deepest love
cannot stop heaven
from calling someone home.

Still, my heart
will keep loving you
as if you never left.

— Angels Are Near

20/03/2026

So sad to hear about Jenni Murray’s passing. A consummate broadcaster. Rest in Peace. 💜

15/03/2026

On this UK Mother’s Day… Thinking of those whose Mothers, M**s and Mums are no longer with them… 💜💜💜

Morning begins the same way it always did—
light slipping through the curtains.
For a second everything feels normal,
until memory quietly arrives.

I stop in the middle of simple things—
washing dishes, tying my shoes.
Your name crosses my thoughts
like a shadow moving through sunlight.

A red bird passes through the sky above me,
bright against the pale morning clouds.
It disappears faster than I expect,
leaving the air strangely empty.

I pause again without meaning to,
standing still in the middle of the room.
Grief hides inside ordinary hours,
waiting between breaths.

Somewhere a clock keeps ticking forward,
patient and unaware of loss.
But my mind still circles the same moment,
the day everything shifted quietly.

So many times each day I pause like this,
hands resting against the present.
Not searching for answers anymore—
just learning how memory walks beside me.

—Tears of Memory

15/03/2026

💜😔💜

There is a quiet sadness
in living beyond the people
who once made your world feel whole.

Their voices fade from everyday life
their chairs sit empty
their laughter echoes only in memory.

Yet the love they gave
does not disappear.

It travels with you
through every step forward
through every season that changes.

Outliving them may break your heart
but loving them
will always be a gift.

—Grieving With Love

13/03/2026

💜💜💜

A small white flower rises from the soft blur of the field,
two drops of water resting gently on its petals.
The air feels still, almost thoughtful,
as if the morning itself is remembering something.

People say memories appear and disappear,
like thoughts passing through the day.
But with you it has never been like that.
You never arrive suddenly or leave quietly.

You are simply there,
woven into the quiet corners of my mind.
In the way I pause when I see certain flowers,
in the soft calm of early mornings.

Sometimes I catch myself smiling
at something only you would understand.
Other times I sit quietly,
feeling the familiar shape of your absence.

But even that absence carries your presence.
It moves through my thoughts
like light across a still pond,
never leaving, never fading.

Just like the gentle drops on this flower,
your memory rests inside my days.
Not as a passing thought—
but as something that lives within me.

—Silent Tears For You

09/03/2026

💔💔💔

The lake is still tonight,
its dark surface holding the weight of the sky.
Stars scatter quietly above the mountains
like distant thoughts no one can reach.

A narrow dock stretches out across the water,
each plank leading into silence.
At the end sits a small glowing butterfly,
soft light resting in the middle of the night.

People believe grief is one moment.
A single day that changes everything.
But they do not see the mornings after,
when the world expects you to continue normally.

They do not see how simple things change.
How the quiet house feels unfamiliar.
How the air itself seems heavier
when someone who belonged there is missing.

So I step carefully through each new day,
learning again what living requires.
Breathing, walking, answering questions
that no one realizes are difficult now.

And when night returns to the lake,
I imagine that small light waiting there,
reminding me that love still glows softly
even across distances I cannot cross.

—Grieving With Love

07/03/2026

💔

The little bear sits quietly on the shelf tonight.
Still holding the same small heart in its paws.
I placed it there years ago,
never imagining the meaning it would carry now.

Some objects become witnesses to love.
They watch birthdays and ordinary afternoons.
They watch laughter fill a room
and never expect the silence that follows.

Now that tiny heart feels heavier.
As if it understands the language of loss.
As if it knows the way a human heart
keeps loving even when the room grows quiet.

I wish someone had prepared my heart.
Given it instructions for mornings like these.
Explained how to wake up
when the person you love isn’t there anymore.

But hearts don’t learn that way.
They remember instead.
They hold every smile and shared moment
like fragile glass kept safe in the dark.

And somehow the love inside them continues.
Not loudly, not with grand declarations.
Just steady and quiet,
like a candle that refuses to go out.

So my heart keeps learning slowly.
How to walk through days without you here.
But loving you—
that part it never had to learn. ❤️

—Grieving With Love

01/03/2026

💜💜💜

A golden butterfly rests on a cracked stone,
light falling gently from above
as if the world knows
this small creature needs protecting.

Missing you feels like that stone—
solid, unmoving,
holding weight in silence
no one else can measure.

The house carries your absence
in ordinary places:
the empty hook by the door,
the chair angled slightly toward mine.

It is not loud pain.
It is the steady ache
of reaching for someone
who no longer answers.

Some evenings I sit in dim light,
watching dust settle,
thinking how strange it is
that love remains so bright.

The cracks in the stone do not disappear,
but the butterfly does not flee from them.
It rests anyway,
wings open in fragile defiance.

I am learning to do the same—
to let the ache exist
without letting it harden
the tenderness you left in me.

Missing you is heavy,
but loving you is still worth carrying.

— Memories of You

24/02/2026

💜💜💜

21/02/2026

💜

Not fix it. Not conquer it. Just exist with it. Some days I think I have it handled, and then something small undoes me and I realize I am still very much at the beginning of something I did not choose.
Grief did not come with instructions. No one handed me a guide on how to carry this kind of absence into the grocery store, into work, into family gatherings. I am figuring it out as I go. I am learning what I can sit through and what I need to leave. I am learning that energy is different now, that patience is thinner, that some things simply matter less.
There is something honest about admitting I do not know how to do this well. I am not trying to be brave or inspiring. I am trying to live inside a reality that permanently shifted. That takes time. It takes repetition. It takes falling apart and getting back up without applause.
If you are still learning how to exist with your loss too, that does not mean you are failing. This is not a class you pass. It is something you grow into slowly, unevenly. And even years in, many of us are still adjusting to the weight of it. You are not behind. You are grieving.
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