If she could, my wife would accompany me on my evening excursions, for one of her many loves was poetry. Thomas, Whitman, Eliot, Shakespeare, and King David of the Psalms. Lovers of words, makers of language. Looking back, I am surprised by my passion for it, and sometimes I even regret it now. Poetry brings great beauty to life, but also great sadness, and I'm not sure it's a fair exchange for someone my age. A man should enjoy other things if he can; he should spend his final days in the sun. Mine will be spent by a reading lamp.
I shuffle toward her and sit in the chair beside her bed. My back aches when I sit. I must get a new cushion for this chair, I remind myself for the hundredth time. I reach for her hand and take it, bony and fragile. It feels nice. She responds with a twitch, and gradually her thumb begins to softly rub my finger. I do not speak until she does; this I have learned. Most days I sit in silence until the sun goes down, and on days like those I know nothing about her.
Minutes pass before she finally turns to me. She is crying. I smile and release her hand, then reach in my pocket. I take out a handkerchief and wipe at her tears. She looks at me as I do so, and I wonder what she is thinking.
"That was a beautiful story."
A light rain begins to fall. Little drops tap gently on the window. I take her hand again. It is going to be a good day, a very good day. A magical day. I smile, I can't help it.
"Yes, it is," I tell her.
"Did you write it?" she asks. Her voice is like a whisper, a light wind flowing through the leaves.
"Yes," I answer.
She turns toward the nightstand. Her medicine is in a little cup. Mine too. Little pills, colors like a rainbow so we won't forget to take them. They bring mine here now, to her room, even though they're not supposed to.
"I've heard it before, haven't I?"
"Yes," I say again, just as I do every time on days like these. I have learned to be patient.
She studies my face. Her eyes are as green as ocean waves.
"It makes me feel less afraid," she says.
"I know." I nod, rocking my head softly.
She turns away, and I wait some more. She releases my hand and reaches for her water glass. It is on her nightstand, next to the medicine. She takes a sip.
"Is it a true story?" She sits up a little in her bed and takes another drink. Her body is still strong. "I mean, did you know these people?"
"Yes," I say again. I could say more, but usually I don't. She is still beautiful. She asks the obvious:
"Well, which one did she finally marry?"
I answer: "The one who was right for her." "Which one was that?"
I smile. "You'll know," I say quietly, "by the end of the day. You'll know."
She does not know what to think about this but does not question me further. Instead she begins to fidget. She is thinking of a way to ask me another question, though she isn't sure how to do it. Instead she chooses to put it off for a moment and reaches for one of the little paper cups.
"Is this mine?"
"No, this one is," and I reach over and push her medicine toward her. I cannot grab it with my fingers. She takes it and looks at the pills. I can tell by the way she is looking at them that she has no idea what they are for. I use both hands to pick up my cup and dump the pills into my mouth. She does the same. There is no fight today. That makes it easy. I raise my cup in a mock toast and wash the gritty flavor from my mouth with my tea. It is getting colder. She swallows on faith and washes them down with more water.
A bird starts to sing outside the window, and we both turn our heads. We sit quietly for a while, enjoying something beautiful together. Then it is lost, and she sighs.
"I have to ask you something else," she says. "Whatever it is, I'll try to answer."
"It's hard, though."
She does not look at me, and I cannot see her eyes. This is how she hides her thoughts. Some things never change.
"Take your time," I say. I know what she will ask. Finally she turns to me and looks into my eyes. She offers a gentle smile, the kind you share with a child, not a lover.
"I don't want to hurt your feelings because you've been so nice to me, but . . ."
I wait. Her words will hurt me. They will tear a piece from my heart and leave a scar.
"Who are you?"
We have lived at Creekside Extended Care Facility for three years now. It was her decision to come here, partly because it was near our home, but also because she thought it would be easier for me. We boarded up our home because neither of us could bear to sell it, signed some papers, and just like that we received a place to live and die in exchange for some of the freedom for which we had worked a lifetime.
She was right to do this, of course. There is no way I could have made it alone, for sickness has come to us, both of us. We are in the final minutes in the day of our lives, and the clock is ticking. Loudly. I wonder if I am the only one who can hear it.
A throbbing pain courses through my fingers, and it reminds me that we have not held hands with fingers interlocked since we moved here. I am sad about this, but it is my fault, not hers. It is arthritis in the worst form, rheumatoid and advanced. My hands are misshapen and grotesque now, and they throb during most of my waking hours. I look at them and want them gone, amputated, but then I would not be able to do the little things I must do. So I use my claws, as I call them sometimes, and every day I take her hands despite the pain, and I do my best to hold them because that is what she wants me to do.
Although the Bible says man can live to be 120, I don't want to, and I don't think my body would make it even if I did. It is falling apart, dying one piece at a time, steady erosion on the inside and at the joints. My hands are useless, my kidneys are beginning to fail, and my heart rate is decreasing every month. Worse, I have cancer again, this time of the prostate. This is my third bout with the unseen enemy, and it will take me eventually, though not till I say it is time. The doctors are worried about me, but I am not. I have no time for worry in this twilight of my life.
Of our five children, four are still living, and though it is hard for them to visit, they come often, and for this I am thankful. But even when they aren't here, they come alive in my mind every day, each of them, and they bring to mind the smiles and tears that come with raising a family. A dozen pictures line the walls of my room. They are my heritage, my contribution to the world. I am very proud. Sometimes I wonder what my wife thinks of them as she dreams, or if she thinks of them at all, or if she even dreams. There is so much about her I don't understand anymore.
I wonder what my daddy would think of my life and what he would do if he were me. I have not seen him for fifty years and he is now but a shadow in my thoughts. I cannot picture him clearly anymore; his face is darkened as if a light shines from behind him. I am not sure if this is due to a failing memory or simply the passage of time. I have only one picture of him, and this too has faded. In another ten years it will be gone and so will I, and his memory will be erased like a message in the sand. If
not for my diaries, I would swear I had lived only half as long as I have. Long periods of my life seem to have vanished. And even now I read the passages and wonder who I was when I wrote them, for I cannot remember the events of my life. There are times I sit and wonder where it all has gone.
"My name," I say, "is Duke." I have always been a John Wayne fan.
"Duke," she whispers to herself, "Duke." She thinks for a moment, her forehead wrinkled, her eyes serious.
"Yes," I say, "I'm here for you." And always will be, I think to myself.
She flushes with my answer. Her eyes become wet and red, and tears begin to fall. My heart aches for her, and I wish for the thousandth time that there was something I could do. She says:
"I'm sorry. I don't understand anything that's happening to me right now. Even you. When I listen to you talk I feel like I should know you, but I don't. I don't even know my name."
She wipes at her tears and says, "Help me, Duke, help me remember who I am. Or at least, who I was. I feel so lost."
I answer from my heart, but I lie to her about her name. As I have about my own. There is a reason for this.
"You are Hannah, a lover of life, a strength to those who shared in your friendships. You are a dream, a creator of happiness, an artist who has touched a thousand souls. You've led a full life and wanted for nothing because your needs are spiritual and you have only to look inside you. You are kind and loyal, and you are able to see beauty where others do not. You are a teacher of wonderful lessons, a dreamer of better things."
I stop for a moment and catch my breath. Then, "Hannah, there is no reason to feel lost, for:
Nothing is ever really lost, or can be lost,
No birth, identity, form--no object of the world,
Nor life, nor force, nor any visible thing; . . . The body, sluggish, aged, cold--the embers left from earlier fires,
. . . shall duly flame again;"
She thinks about what I have said for a moment. In the silence, I look toward the window and notice that the rain has stopped now. Sunlight is beginning to filter into her room. She asks:
"Did you write that?"
"No, that was Walt Whitman." "Who?"