Notes from the Funeral Pyre: Poems About Grief Worth Memorizing

Because some elegies are meant to be carried in your bloodstream.

Grief takes many forms.

Unfortunately, it’s not linear, pretty, polite, predictable or easy to witness. 

But, poetry? Poetry knows how to sit, steadfast, with grief.

In the wake of loss—whether of a person, a love, a dream or a version of ourselves—we often find ourselves without language to articulate the ache we feel. 

Poetry becomes the balm and the eulogy. A ritual. A reckoning. A quiet companion when the house has gone still and the mind is in agony.

Below, we’ve curated a collection of beloved verses that know mourning intimately. 

Some are meant to be whispered. 

Others to be memorized—like spells—to carry in your mouth when memory presses too hard on your ribs and you can’t find words that feel right.