i never thought i'd write a poem about this boy or his mother (though i did write a college essay about "a person of integrity" based on the mother) because i never thought i could capture the tragedy and energy involved in this family...they live through it everyday and i don't...i'm just an outsider and help out here and there.
but i've been away for a while and when i came to visit it kind've just struck me...the whole situation and all...you don't realize the craziness of it all sometimes unless you have the space and distance of stepping back.
so here it is--as an outsider anyways...the poem i never should've written.
peace.
song for the boy and his mother
by zenjew
steel oxygen tanks
snake into the nose
of this unmoving
adult child
bathed by
different hands
every night.
and fed through a tube
attached to a
swollen stomach
he lies still
sometimes clenching
sometimes not
his eyes flit around the room
catching nothing,
and while the world
steps around him--
some sing for him
and a few
even pray to him.
and there is no calendar
in his room
just a large, blank
round clock
that spins in circles
every day
is the same day--
his mother becomes
moments, days
rituals
and then
sleeps at night.
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ps - cool poem
"no calendar in his room" - thats a really powerful line. we have calendars in our rooms, and how often to we just live our days over and over without considering how blessed we are to be able make the calendate useful
beautiful, and so sad..
thanks dish network affiliate. if you're really a person.
anon--thanks for reading! btw, did you just make up a word? "calendate" is such a great word! i might just spice up the poem with a little avant-gardism and incorporate that word somehow.
Woah this poem is really sad. I take it as a personal lesson in appreciating what I have.
Very moving.
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