Frances Bean Cobain pens heartbreaking tribute to father Kurt Cobain on 30th anniversary of his death

Frances Bean is the only child of Kurt and Courtney Love

Frances Bean Cobain has paid tribute to her father Kurt Cobain on the 30th anniversary of the Nirvana frontman’s death.

Cobain died by suicide on 5 April 1994 at the age of 27.

Taking to Instagram, Frances Bean, 31, shared a carousel of photos of her and her father when she was a child, including “the last time [they] were together” before his death.

“30 years ago my dad’s life ended,” Frances Bean’s post began. “The 2nd & 3rd photo capture the last time we were together while he was still alive.”

She continued: “His mom Wendy would often press my hands to her cheeks & say, with a lulling sadness, ‘you have his hands’. She would breathe them in as if it were her only chance to hold him just a little bit closer, frozen in time. I hope she’s holding his hands wherever they are.”

“In the last 30 years my ideas around loss have been in a continuous state of metamorphosing,” the model wrote. “The biggest lesson learned through grieving for almost as long as I’ve been conscious, is that it serves a purpose. The duality of life & death, pain & joy, yin & yang, need to exist along side each other or none of this would have any meaning. It is the impermanent nature of human existence which throws us into the depths of our most authentic lives. As It turns out, there is no greater motivation for leaning into loving awareness than knowing everything ends.”

Kurt Cobain (left) and Frances Bean Cobain (AP/Getty Images)

She continued: “I wish I could’ve known my Dad. I wish I knew the cadence of his voice, how he liked his coffee or the way it felt to be tucked in after a bedtime story. I always wondered if he would’ve caught tadpoles with me during the muggy Washington summers, or if he smelled of Camel Lights & strawberry nesquik (his favorites, I’ve been told).”

“But there is also deep wisdom being on an expedited path to understanding how precious life is,” Frances Bean added. “He gifted me a lesson in death that can only come through the LIVED experience of losing someone. It’s the gift of knowing for certain, when we love ourselves & those around us with compassion, with openness, with grace, the more meaningful our time here inherently becomes.”

The singer said she has held onto a letter her father wrote to her before she was born, which reads: “Where you go or wherever I go, I will always be with you.”

“He kept this promise because he is present in so many ways,” she said. “Whether it’s by hearing a song or through the hands we share, in those moments I get to spend a little time with my dad & he feels transcendent. ✨”

Frances Bean concluded with a message for others who have lost a loved one. “To anyone who has wondered what it would’ve looked like to live along side the people they have lost, I’m holding you in my thoughts today. The meaning of our grief is the same,” she said.

Frances Bean is the only child of Cobain and Hole frontwoman Courtney Love.

Last year, she married Riley Hawk, son of pro-skateboarder Tony Hawk, in a move that delighted Nineties kids.

The wedding was reportedly officiated by REM frontman Michael Stipe, Frances Bean’s godfather.

The model was previously married to musician Isaiah Silva, but filed for divorce in March 2016 after less than two years of marriage. The exes became locked in a legal battle over one of her late father’s guitars – the acoustic guitar he played during Nirvana’s iconic MTV Unplugged performance in November 1993.

In May 2018, a judge ruled that Silva could keep the guitar, which he ultimately auctioned off for more than $6m.