rain

it rained the day you died

did you know?

teardrops on the glass
raindrops on our faces


i wanted to push your bed into the garden

cool refreshing gentle fall on your hot hot parched skin
sweet rain in your dry dry mouth

and then the sky cleared
and the sun set

she

no more difficult steps

no more tortuous excursions to the window, the toilet, the door

no more strong determined fragile tired tired smiles

her life has shrunk to this room
this bed

absorbed now in the process of each breath
she is so preoccupied with the business of dying
she is too busy for living

she

the primary she
my beginning and ending

waiting

like a Belsen survivor
life stripped away to the bare bones

gaunt, yellow, stretched
the hollow people stumbling out into life
blinking in the light

You will not return from wherever it is that you are
not into this life, this world
your eyes sealed, unseeing

what do you see? wherever you are?
what do you hear?
what do you know?

do you know our voices?
whispering murmurings love and loss chit and chat trivial exchanges crisp packet rustlings rememberings hello-farewells laughter and tears tea-drinking planning silences

do you know us?

you will not survive and see the sun again
in this world


so very very far from being who you are

still yourself
precious fragile tenuous

but you are not retrievable

her slippers

have become heartbreaking