I Watched
I watched my mother die.
Did you hear me ...are you listening now?
I didn’t know about death, how could I?
But you learn quickly
When you watch your mother die.
She knew she was going to die.
She fought against it, but she was never afraid.
Was she? I think sometimes maybe she was.
We never saw it, she wouldn’t let us.
Still she knew.
I didn’t want to be there.
And I didn’t want to be anywhere else.
There is a picture now burned in my soul.
I see it sometimes when I close my eyes
And sometimes when I don’t.
She battled against it all day that last day.
She didn’t want to leave, not us.
She thought we weren’t ready to let her go.
She thought our pain would be too great.
She was right.
So she struggled to breathe all day
And I’d sing to her and read to her and give her valium.
She cried out from a pain that I could not comprehend
And I’d hold her and kiss her and give her morphine.
And sometimes she’d smile.
And then …I told her to stop.
In a quiet moment between waves of pain and gasps of breath,
Iwhispered goodbye and told her to go.
And her breathing eased and her pain waned
And she slept.
She slept as her body quietly shut down.
Iheld her as she began to change color
AndI saw death slowly overtake her.
And as I counted her breaths, I held mine
Silently screaming “breathe Mama please breathe”.
And in the early morning hours of September 10
I watched my mother die.
And I will never be the same.
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