Have you ever found yourself yearning for things left behind in the past? Pining for things you can never change? You find that your heart is heavy during these intense moments, partly because you know you can never get those moments and things back, partly because you miss it. This is called “Saudade.” Saudade (pronounced soh-dah-duh) is a Portuguese word denoting a deep, emotional state of nostalgic or profound melancholic longing for an absent something or someone that one loves while carrying the repressed knowledge that what once was can never be.

In other words, it is the presence of absence.

Below are 2 poems, each suggesting an introspection into, and a critical understanding of, our deep yearnings for something of the past. It’s a painful, agonizing, traumatic yearning for what once was, but can never be again. The first poem is about my personal longing for the innocence of my childhood, not gone forever. It was simple, bright and happy times, not overcast by the responsibilities and rat-races of our emerging adulthood. The second poem is a longing for, in this case, someone else’s youth. It’s a poem that illustrates something that we already miss, even before it is gone. A presence of expected absence.

I’ll let the poems speak for itself.

Nethmie Dehigama

Featured Image: Julian Callos

Poetry and Poetry Art by Me.