Writers Digest/Palliative Care//PAD Challenge April 4/

Day 3 PAD Challenge April 2015.

Palliative Care

the room was quiet         except for the soft chatter of the machines

talking among themselves        i wasn't sure if they were my friends

or enemies        it was alien territory

you seemed to sleep to their rhythm of their voices       did they chat about the day

whisper secrets they learned as they watched by the bedside      surely they overheard

the most intimate exchanges        on their screens were the results of their monitors

in a language impossible for me to read       they seemed to crowd around us

kept track of the beat of your heart        kept a graft of what was going on in your brain

your blood pressure        and then it was over       they had done they job

each was disconnected       i missed the reassuring hum of their motors as they were

rolled from the room        it was completely quiet now       we would go to

palliative care        draw the shirt around us        together

we would make his last days as comfortable as possible       and hold them forever in our hearts

April 3, 2015

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Day 4  PAD Challenge April 2015.

Prompt: Departure poem.

That Day

how to talk about your departure       the most profound goodbye       i have ever heard

or not       for you didn't say a word       maybe the words had already been spoken

nothing could be changed       it all happened as it happened      it would stand

we made mistakes       perhaps we didn't always fill in the blanks with our love

we were just humans       you and i       still your departure

was like a word erased       you left your trace       my love for you filled my heart

like a crystal glass suddenly dropped to the floor       splintering to a thousand pieces

when all is quiet       i find you are still here      and my love for you is still here

perhaps we never go anywhere        just change the way others see us

April 4, 2015