Why I Started Writing Poetry After Retiring: One Man’s Story of a Second Beginning

I spent 21 years in customer service.

For two decades, my work was people. Understanding what they needed. Making things right. Showing up with patience and kindness, even on the days when it was not easy. I am proud of that work. But I always knew there was something else I had been carrying alongside it – something quieter, something that had been waiting.

That something was writing.

In March 2026, I retired from Publix Super Markets after 21 years in customer service. And within days, the thing I had been putting off for twenty years became the thing I finally had time for.

The Writing That Never Stopped

I have been writing since before I could call it writing. Sitting by the water, listening to music, watching the lights reflect – those were the moments when the words came. Not structured writing sessions. Not a formal practice. Just a feeling that demanded to be put down somewhere, and a pen nearby when it happened.

Over the years, I filled pages. On planes. At restaurants. In quiet moments between the busyness of working life. I wrote about love, friendship, and hope. About the warmth that holds people together and the sadness that comes when we lose touch with it. About my parents, my family, and the simple things that make a life feel like something worth showing up for.

I never thought much about publishing. I wrote because I had to. Because the words needed somewhere to go.

Retirement Changed Everything

There is something that happens when you retire, if you are lucky. The noise settles. The calendar clears. And the things you have been putting off – the things you told yourself you would get to someday – suddenly become impossible to ignore.

Someday arrived for me this spring.

I started organizing my poems. Reading back through years of writing. Realizing that there was something here worth sharing – not just with family, but with anyone who might need what I was trying to say. Anyone who had been feeling like the world was too cold, too divided, too loud. Anyone who needed a reminder that warmth is still out there.

That was how Words From The Heart Productions came to life.

Three Books, One Mission

I launched three collections together: The Essence of Love, Warmth, Care, & Feelings, and Heart & Soul.

Each one is different in its own way. The first is built around the everyday moments of love – a smile, a hand held, a kind word. The second is a tribute to my parents and the foundation they gave our family. The third is the most personal – written with real urgency about what I see happening in our world, and a deep belief that we can find our way back to each other.

All three are simple. That was always the goal. Not poetry that requires an English degree. Poetry that a person can read on their porch in the morning and carry with them through the day.

For Anyone Who Has Been Waiting

I am not telling this story to talk about myself. I am telling it because I know I am not the only one.

There are a lot of people out there – retired or close to it, or in the middle of a career that does not leave much room – who have something they have always meant to do. A creative itch that never went away. A skill or a passion or a dream that kept getting pushed to someday.

Retirement gave me permission to stop waiting. And whatever your version of that is – painting, writing, music, building things, teaching – I hope you find yours before someday becomes never.

Mine turned out to be poetry—specifically, poetry I hope will remind people that love and warmth are real, and that one kind word sent someone’s way can change more than we know.

If you have your own second-beginning story, I’d genuinely love to hear it. And if you’d like to read the poetry that grew out of mine, you’ll find my collections at wordsftheart.com/shop. Reach me anytime at john@wordsftheart.com.