1
Each visit I find you where I left you
We haven't moved
Yet I am winded from the battle
You do not wish to
We do not wish you to
Do not wish to
Really do
Beside you
I think I heard a hurricane beating behind closed doors
I felt my bruises the entire length of each stay
Your speech, manner and mien
Where are they?
2
I have no key to your door;
I tread the fragile catwalk between your lucidity and hallucination.
It's hard to notice when the door is ajar
When it's only a few heartbeats wide
I hold you as you listen and speak
Fully present, yet wholly mind-roaming.
Tomorrow we will speak again
I will find you where I left you.
3
If words anchor thought
I will gather enough of them
To build a mind bridge towards you
Wishing it will span the angry swirls
Of water churning beneath.
But like Hope's slippery pontoon, my words fall apart
Leaving me in a wet and remembered now.
See Siong wrote this poem in August 2009. This poem was published in the latest issue (Vol. 8 No. 4 Oct 2009) of the Quarterly Literary Review Singapore, the lnternet literary journal of Singapore.
As See Siong is a friend of mine, this poem is more poignant to all of us who are aware of his mother’s condition.
His other poem in the QLRS, Words, can be found here.
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