Alzheimer's Eyes

It happened quiet

Insidiously

Something first
You cannot see
Maybe
One lost look once in a while
One pair of winter boots
You needn’t need to buy
We were walking
in the streets happily anyway
without knowing what would be the next day
Then one day
I opened your closet
in this apartment of yours
where as a child I spent
the most brilliant hours
And in this closet I saw
your pair of… glasses
in place of your… slippers.

And I found the slippers… in the kitchen cupboard.
Then I opened the microwave oven
And in it discovered something crazily rotten.
And I opened the fridge and in it found unopened mail.

This expression on your face
This gaze in your eyes like an exoplanet
from a galaxy -the furthest
Those names you would mix
The stories you would tell
The ghosts you would meet.
Then in this Alzheimer house
You were stuck,
locked down
like us on those Covid days.
Your visions of beloved departed ones
As if they were here -oh you loved them!
Your dreams of world travels
As if you could run away from there -oh the places you visited!
This is I’m sure what you wanted to say:
Take me away,
out of this prison
out of my body,
out of my mind.
I put my hand on your arm -warm hand on warm arm.
I cried.

In:
“Do You Hear Me Now?”
An Anthology of Mental Health Journeys, 2020