Days Like These

Cherry

By Silver Spun Sand

Tue, 12 Jan 2016
  • 3105 reads
8 comments
 
Peeling potatoes at the kitchen sink I watch him walk back 
down the path – no longer with the swinging, rolling gait
I could have recognised from a mile away; he’d been feeding
the birds...and it takes him a while...this man whose motto – 
some fifteen years since became,  ‘Sorry; I don’t do quick!’
 
The man, 
lived life, literally,  in the fast lane,
for whom time took on a whole new meaning; 
diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease
in the prime of his life
 
the man 
forced onto the hard shoulder
through no fault of his own.
 
the man
I’d helped dress this morning; 
fastened his belt, buttoned up his shirt
and tied his tie. 
 
So I hear him come in...finally, after fumbling for his keys 
he swears blind have deliberately gone missing,
just to spite him
 
except, he finds them in the end, with a little help from me.
 
His hands, now with their customary tremor, dig
deep into his pocket;  on this occasion, for a little 
silver box of pills – twenty at least, pink, white, 
blue and yellow.  
 
Fetch a drink, as, proudly placed, on the table
a trug – full of early Maris Piper...and a cucumber, 
lovingly reared in the greenhouse from seed,
in the shape of a question mark.
 
But we’ve both, long-since stopped asking ‘why?’
 
Learned to accept what life has deigned to dish out to us
for whatever reasons it may have had, and be grateful
of our late daughter’s legacy...if she could carry on
from day to day, always a smile on her lips, then 
the hell can we! 
 
Each year, though, I can’t help but dread winter the more, 
 
but when the freeze finally sets in, it’s recalling
days like these, in all their multi-coloured madness
will keep me sane
 
and if there is one thing I have learned from this crazy
little thing they call life is that, most certainly,
there are days, and then, there are days.
 
Certificate PG
Poem
Silver Spun Sand Poems
Philosophy
Love
Inspiration Point (work that responds to our weekly writing cue)
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Comments

Submitted by VeraClark on

Beautifully expressed. Made my heart ache.

 

Submitted by Silver Spun Sand on

Thanks, so much, Vera.

 

Submitted by EB on

Stuff we can never expect. Then we have to get on with life as it's thrown at us. It made Vera's heart ache. Mine too. 

Submitted by Silver Spun Sand on

EB - how right you are about that 'stuff'.  

Tina

 

Submitted by Bee on

This seems a lot about acceptance - the hardest thing to acheive. compassionately written.  Keep recalling and writing, Tina, and don't worry too much about keeping sane - it's not all it's cracked up to be - apparently... Not that I'd know. 

Bee

Submitted by Silver Spun Sand on

Bee - I am humbled by your words.

Tina

 

Submitted by MarciaMarcia on

It is such a journey, this life we live and how very grateful we can be, to be able to find a voice to tell and then find another's voice to listen. We need each other to bare witness that we have lived all of it and won't be forgotten. 

Thank you so for sharing your story Silver Spun Sand... it is told beautifully ...MarciaMarcia 

Submitted by Silver Spun Sand on

Such beauty, and so much truth, in those words of yours, Marcia.

Tina