My mother died of emphysema at age 70.
She never could stop smoking, even after she was diagnosed and was very sick.
“Dying, She Was Someone Else”
Dying, she was someone else to me
and to herself perhaps or more entirely
herself than any other time, pared down
for the essential battle to breathe.
Great-eyed with each wrack of coughing
as if in awe—of what I am not sure
perhaps of what she could endure
perhaps at the enormity of pain
perhaps in fear of not enduring.
Trembling hands, oddly brown against the sheet,
after I was gone, lay still.
Alice Roy is a retired college professor living in Washington State.
SHARING STORIES is a weekly column for and about the 50 plus crowd living in the Puget Sound region. Send your stories and photos to ariele@comcast.net. Tell local or personal stories; discuss concerns around aging and other issues; share solutions, good luck, and reasons to celebrate; poems are fine too. Pieces may be edited or excerpted. We reserve the right to select among pieces. Photos are always a plus and a one-sentence bio is requested (where you live, maybe age or career, retired status, etc.).
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