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i.
freedom
white, thin and fighting in the bed
she lay rigid under the white sheets
and we knew she was going
she had lasted so long
she was tough
our mother
lovely smile and all, so many memories,
her loud laughter
her great strong arms around us, so many times,
so many years
she loved us firey, with passion
and now she was going, her small body
too small for her
gigantic spirit
but she kept hanging on
so we drove our father home to rest and eat,
so tired, his body
exhausted from these last years of caring for her
and the phone call came before we got inside
"she's gone"
so back we went, down to the home,
and even at the entrance we could hear the music
from her room
handel's "and the glory, the glory of the lord"
she had died with my brother and sister watching
they saw the last breath stilled and lifted from her
and called us
and turned on the tape recorder where my sister had
recklessly inserted a tape of the Messiah
and amazingly it burst forth at her favorite part,
"and the Glory of the Lord"
the most glorious of music
like her life
so when we came in
we could see
her soul rising, lifting free, rising
in untold delight
ii. the gift
but the greatest gift was for our father
he told us later, weeping
it was
just hours before she went
she had lain for days without speaking
suspended
somewhere else, unreachable, austere
and he sat by her bed, the old man, for hours, alone
with her
wondering
he had never known if she loved him or not, really
deeply as he loved her,
she had been a firefly, a meteor in the night sky
his whole life
a blazing sun, a teacher
and lover of humanity
with hardly a glance for him
but he had endured hoping/fearing
for so long, for so many years
patient in his deep, helpless love
and now he held her hand
as she lay rigid in the bed,
knowing she was going, and once again
he told her,
"i love you, honey"
watching
as always, with infinite, sad love and
patience
knowing she was gone from him
when suddenly
magic
wresting from deep in the earth her last
monumental strength
she opens her eyes, blue as the sea,
and squeezes his hand, a light firm pressure,
and smiles
with her wide happy mouth
and speaks, for him alone,
"And I love you."
and he can't believe it
such relief washes his whole life
clean
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