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MOTHER
By
Madeline Banfield
Dedicated
to my mother, Clara Tarrant, who suffered from Alzheimer's
disease. She passed peacefully away on March 1, 2001,
in Antigonish, Nova Scotia.
I
originally wrote this poem for my four sisters and four
brothers. We were all so devastated by our mother's illness
and had a rough time dealing with it. I have named the
piece simply "MOTHER" and have since been told
by others that it could also have been their mother or
father.
I
give permission for anyone to use this poem in any form
if it serves to help people deal with their own losses,
as it has helped many others.
MOTHER
She
sits and prays and smiles and stares, but knows not what
she sees,
Her
eyes are empty, blank and dim, her gnarled hands clutching
beads.
Her once bright mind has faded now, her quick wit dulled
with age,
Her many talents laid to rest beneath a cruel outrage.
Where once she was a vibrant soul, whose prayers were loud
and grand,
She's now just full of chatter and so hard to understand.
Her days are filled with waiting, not that she knows it's
so,
She smiles and waves at everyone as they all come and go.
Where
once her voice was raised in song, words easy to be found,
She struggles now to find a note, and strives to make the
sound,
Her stories mostly jumbled, her poems never rhyme,
Her memories seem rooted in a very far off time.
Her world, once so exciting, and filled with things to
do,
Has now become an empty shell, where nothing's ever new.
Her long life still continues, but alas, it holds no joy,
She smiles and chats, but makes no sense, to any passer-by.
Now,
when I see her where she is, I think of where she's been,
The long road she has traveled and all the things she's
seen,
Of the children that she nurtured, the people that she
helped,
Now she relies on others and cannot help herself.
And while it pains me every time I see her sitting there,
I always hope she'll know me, but all she does is stare.
Since her memory is so distant, I can't expect too much,
But I always pray, just one more time, that we might get
in touch.
Yet,
I know it will not happen, though I wish it weren't so,
I touch her cheek and turn to leave, she doesn't watch
me go.
Her eyes have moved beyond me to some strange distant place,
And I wonder if she's happy, staring into empty space.
I walk away and don't look back, the pain held deep inside,
I hope that I can reach the door before I start to cry,
But I never seem to make it as the tears begin to fall,
And I quickly pass the other rooms to hurry down the hall.
I
walk into the sunlight, see the flowers where they grow,
And hurry home to life that moves, to days that ebb and
flow.
I carry with me in my heart, the memory of a time,
When my mother was so much alive, and she was so much mine.
© Madeline
Banfield 2002
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