Quivering hands stretch, palm down
Searching the empty space
He has prostate cancer
Diabetes
Dementia
Ankylosing spondylitis
Years of life worn thin as rose petals
Skin as thin as rose petals
She reaches into the night air
Clasps his fingers
Still clinging to his smell and the comfort of his arms
Though he no longer remembers who she is
Long nights
Days etched in granite, as
Light lumbers slowly, traversing the sky
She waits as he climbs the stairs, rises from the toilet, puts on his shoes
Grabs for her arm when his world spins
She waits
Helps, pulls, pushes, catches, prods, screams to the wind
Longing for Thursday afternoon
Respite
Tea with women friends
Respite
Her tether to the outer world
They meet
Aged and wrinkled with bright pink lipstick
Talk about husbands
Parkinson’s, heart failure, hip fractures, wheelchairs
She tells them she has a pebble in her shoe and reaches for a tissue
Then returns home
In the evening her mind counts
Eleven women friends whose husbands died this year
Succumbed to age, stroke, heart failure, pneumonia
She waits her turn
Wondering what Greece will look like in the spring
How sweet the apples will taste in fall
Trying to recall an ocean voyage
Salt water
Youth
A cry
She wakens uncertain if it was from her lips, or his
Checks to see if he is still breathing
Rolls him over to the left
His arm drapes across her shoulder
Thin, frail, tremulous, yet familiar
I am here, she whispers
Wondering how much longer they will share this bed
Listening again to the sounds of his breath
Her mind searching for something else

DKL 6/21/14