I am honored to call the poetess who wrote this poem my dear friend.  She is wonderfully talented and gifted at being able to put into words what so many women feel after they have lost their angels.

You must be so strong...
by Gwen Flowers

"You must be so strong...
I could never survive the loss of one of my children.
It would KILL me to lose a child."
What is she thinking?
Is that a choice?
because my choice then,
At the moment i learned my baby had died,
My choice was to go  with her.
let me die, too!
But i did not get to choose.
Strong?
No, not me.
I barely have the strength to take each new breath.
I begged God to take me.
let me go with her.
or in her place.
What strength is this?
Does she really think it was strength,
or a matter of will...
I think if I was strong,
I would handle this much better.
Would I?
Or, perhaps,
It is only that I have learned
to take each breath
in spite of the ache of emptiness.
My body continues to function.
My broken heart still beats.
I have willed it a thousand times to stop.
Stop.
But it goes on,
My shattered soul goes on, too.
And each new day
I remember.
I am glad to be alive.
But I am not strong.
No,
I survive, 
I am  a Mom.

Gwen Flowers