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It's Tuesday, it's May, already.
It's going so fast. The words of my friend C.,
in her waning days.

I stumbled onto a tender scene tonight:
C. lying in her bed, her husband nestled close,
their 23-year-old daughter snuggled next to Dad.
Older son attendant in a chair beside the bed.
I felt the intruder, but they insisted I visit.
C., with translucent skin delicately stretched
over a bone-frame. She was glowing again,
much like she was 17 years ago when she was
released from a month of chemo. I think that
perhaps she was teetering on the edge then,
and now she hesitates on the precipice.
I lingered only a few minutes --
I was robbing this family of fragile time.

Tick tick tick
as the planet makes its certain turn,
and soft curtains of rain drape themselves
over the foothills in the distance
seen through the bedroom window.

Reliable rain.
Last night it pounded fists on the roof:
hear me hear me hear me.
A lullaby for the living.

goodnight
fare well
sweet dreams