i hope tomorrow's forecast is sunny (napowrimo 2021: day 5)

by prasanna   Apr 5, 2021


yesterday, you remembered nothing but
craved peaches and cream – it’s was your
sunday treat. you spoke for hours, about
how a bird perched outside your window;
a black tern, how they were endemic but
you haven’t seen them for a while –
they’ve been steadily declining
since the eighties.

today, you swung at the nurses;
you were frightened, you thought
they were breaking into your house.
it took three hours to calm you down;
you kept screaming out for grandma.
forgetting she passed years ago –
i envy that.

tomorrow, it’ll be dad’s fiftieth,
and i know it pains him; it’s why
he doesn’t visit as much as he
should – i hope that somehow
you’ll remember.

prompt: "tomorrow's forecast" by star in the napowrimo thread

5


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Latest Comments

  • 3 years ago

    by Poet on the Piano

    This is more devastating than anything I've recently read from you, and maybe because you go into more specifics here, and it also is a different kind of love, a different intensity than what I'm used to. I read the "I envy that" in the second stanza in almost a whisper, that forgetting can sometimes lessen the pain since it can't be acknowledged in the first place, but those who do remember, carry that loss continually with them. At the same time, it's heartbreaking, yet utterly human, to envy that loss of memory, because you just want the pain to be mitigated. There is such a heaviness in this, and I don't think there are ever any easy answers or ways to do things. My grandmother had dementia, and my mom visited every week from out of state, and it hurts her still to know she was one of the few family members who made that effort. We were homeschooled and went with her, working on our assignments and not really realizing what it meant. But I also realize how quickly we can judge others when the emotions may be too overwhelming or complicated for them to sort out, and that a visit is more emotionally-tolling when one can't necessarily be prepared for this or act like it doesn't affect them. That soft plea in the last line, that "somehow" that emphasizes a miracle or a hope you know is not likely, is emotional, almost reading like a prayer, for some kind of healing even if it's a simple moment of remembering. And the kind of sacred moment when a memory/taste/moment IS remembered, that makes it all the more painful too.

    Small note:
    Second line of first stanza: "it's" should be "it" I believe.

  • 3 years ago

    by Em

    This is a very sad piece filled with nostalgia from I'm guessing a dementia patients point of view, it's horrendous having to see a loved one going through this as it's like losing them twice...

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