Vigil

January fifth.
The black car is almost here.
I wait
and I remember:

Early morning, deep December.
Phone rings;
heart sinks;
today, I know, is the day.
Exit day, the expected day: the day to say goodbye.

A rush hour slow-slog through thin and sickly dawn.
Idiot-bright festive lights fail to sense the mood.
Mother in the back seat – quiet, watching, alone.

A red light river – a stop-start stream
of spiteful city commuters –
selfish uncaring daydreamers,
loitering with no intent.

Meanwhile:
Brother - shocked awake and unfresh.
My call renders last night’s Christmas revels
quite obscene.
Paying penance now:
fifty miles on Hangover Highway.

Our final destination:
your final destination.

Grey hospital;
bright corridor;
a hushed white ward.
A curtained bed
(to hide the truth of imminent heartbreak and regret).

You are:
still you -
but not you.
Half-closed blank grey eyes - a thousand-yard-stare

You are there -
but not there.
And it scares me.

But when my mother says your name -
sharply, rebuke-like, shrill -
you react;
you turn;
see something, someone.

Is that instinct?
Recognition?
Hopes rise, slow-fade.
You look – but you do not see.

Me:
What else can I do?
I’m your son, your little boy.
I hold your hand.
The first time for so long -
why did I have to wait till now?

I hold it
like we’re crossing the road and I’m by your side.
You kept me safe once,
now I only wish I could do the same for you.

I hold it
and your fingers feel fragile, thin and frail,
warm and human –
you.

But do you know I’m here at all?

We wait.

(A pause:
I’m not there for journey’s end)

I return to find tightly closed curtains round your bed

Then:
Small room.
"They did all they could".
Tears from mother -
not yet from brother.

This is happening.
I dissolve.

Wooden table: Half-empty box
of too-small paper handkerchieves.
(Random thought: Half-empty?
Whose tears have already been shed in here today?
Did they feel the way I do?
Heart-wrenched,
heart-wracked,
heart-ached
at new-born loss?)

One last bedside visit:
no magic resurrection; no last-minute reprieve.
Hope extinguished.
Gone.
Asleep.

I kiss you on the forehead -
our final father-son touch.
Still warm.

Autumn Evening, Hull ‘90

Possible Futures