In my aunt’s last few months, so many things would change. Always, in her 102 years, her mind had been sharp, her attention dependable. Then, when she was confined to a hospital and then a nursing home for care, nothing was familiar. She adapted, was kind and polite to all the new people around her and all the activities she was encouraged to do, but I could see her slipping away. It was all so exhausting for her, so confusing. I returned from one visit concerned and saddened by the toll all the changes were taking on my aunt, and sat down to write this little poem:
Memory
I’ll be your familiar thing,
what you remember
when everything else is lost.
I’ll be where the memories rest
and where they collide
in a tangled mesh of what was then, and
what is new,
until you can sort it out again.
I can be the fulcrum
around which your shaky balance swings.
When you can’t see the future, and even the past
is pale, you can reach out
and touch me –
an arm, a hand, my familiar face,
and remember
love,
hard times,
what was easy,
who we were.
You can watch me loving you.
You can inch yourself bit by bit across
a new and rocky terrain
in your stubborn and spirited way
until your new world slips into place.
In the meantime,
Here I am.
You remember me, so far.
Touch my hand –
I’ll hold you up.
What a beautiful poem! It certainly expresses that process of memories and familiar things slipping away. Let’s star this for possible inclusion in the book we’re contemplating, with your approval. More about that by email.
Love, Lennie
Thanks, Lennie – Your book sounds interesting – tell me more!
Beautiful poem!
Thanks, Joan – as you know, seeing someone through their end-times is both radiant and wretched, but who would miss that opportunity?
To my beyond wonderful friend, Corrine….. you will never know how timely this email was today as pieces of my mother float away..How much my heart needed this poem. I too, see my mother working so hard to move through each moment in the most respectful and peaceable way possible as she views all independence moving from her inch by painful inch. It makes me proud to be called hers, yet ever so painful watching her struggle for the slightest recall.
Love and hugs of gratitude,
Barb
Dear Barb – Yes, that journey is such a hard though graced one – so sorry you are having to go through that with your mother, but I know you are a great joy and comfort to her. I hear and see your love and respect in all your comments on FB. Much Love,
Corinne