(Borrowed Time)
Sometimes, when I sit alone in the dark, I reminisce of you in a strange melancholia that leaves my whiskey glass untouched. Especially when you got sick and fever gripped your soul. You shuddered as heavy sweat trickled your veins, leaving your cloth seeming to have been soaked in water. I lay beside you with a small piece of cloth soaked in warm water, I put it round your head to lower your temperature. Then I give you your medicine, but even then, you struggle to swallow the pills. Sometimes you don’t take them. You say that the drugs makes you weak, that the pills makes you thin. Maybe it’s true, for you’ve lost some pounds too. The doctor said that this could be the only way to recovery unless a miracle happens. I need this to work baby, please take your pills. I loved you then and I still love you now. I swore to care for you till death did us part, here I am paying my dues. I don’t know how it feels but I know it damn hurts.
I prepare your best meal, then try to make you eat. You always say that you have no appetite, but the doctor had prescribed some multivitamins, I think they might work. They always do. You eat a little, then you stop. You try saying something, but you’re inaudible. I come close to you, put my hands around your cheeks, then I ask, “baby are you okay??”, but you push me away with your feeble hands. As if you’re drowning gasping for air, your dilapidated eyes bulges out, as if you’re suffocating.
“What is it baby? Is it the food?” I keep asking.
You push me away for the second time, as the contents of your stomach comes gushing through the outlet of your mouth in quick successions without a warning. The sludge of it spills on my face, on to the food, and on to the bed that we left making love on ages ago. I get up and circle around you, trying to hold your hair back till you finish, but it dawns on me that you had lost your hair during chemos. You lift your gaze towards me as the vomit trickles down, you lift your hands to rub them off, but you’re too weak, your hands won’t reach. Tears befall your eyes, then you look away feeling embarrassed.
Then I say, “here love, let me help you out.”
You begin sobbing. And I know what you’re thinking. That you’re a burden. That I’m wasting my time. That you’re sorry for turning out this way. And for a moment I don’t know what to say. And yes! Maybe you are a burden. Maybe I’m wasting my time. I know on occasions you’ve thought about euthanasia, but quickly you’ve discarded it considering how much losing you would kill me. But did you know that sometimes I wish that I could suffocate you myself?
Outside, It’s cold. I want to cuddle with you till forever, but I have to clear your mess First. I change the beddings and your clothes too. Then you lay on bed and I smile at you, saying,
“see, honey you look fresh now..”
You’ll smile wryly and look the other way, I know you’re trying to communicate and say something else, like a thank-you-baby kind of thing, but you’re too tired for small talks and I understand. Sometimes I try to initiate a conversation, but I end up talking to the walls. Sometimes I feel needy and I know that’s merely selfish. Those are the times when your best friend sents a text message to check-in on you, I tell her you’re doing alright, but the situation is hard on me. She offers few words of hope, then we end up chatting a few. She always come through for me.
In the morning another night shall have sailed. I’d wake to find you staring at me. I’d move close to you and kiss you on your lips. The kiss would last for 5 seconds, the longest we have kissed since then. I’ll stroke your chin, and ask you what you’d love to have for breakfast, but you shake your head smiling while saying that you don’t want anything.
“I just want you to lie here beside me..” you’d say.
I’d be contemplating about it, then you’d kiss me again. This time passionately like never before. It would make me miss you even more. I’ll return your kiss only to feel your warm hands inside my PJ’s trying to find it’s way in. You’d give me a hand job and for a second I’ll ask you to stop.
“It’s okay honey, I want you to feel good” You’d say.
I know it’s been a while, and I care for you too. I think I’d be dreaming when you’d whisper in my ears,
“baby I want you…”
I’ll be surprised, and afraid that maybe we might end up using your last life battery. But you’ll insist on it saying let’s have it even if it’s the last time we have it.
“I feel stronger today baibe, let’s make love honey…”
You’d proclaim. And I wouldn’t hesitate but watch my steps. Go slow to the rhythm of your heavy breaths. Being cautious that I don’t hurt you. It would last for a short while then we’d slide in an orgasmic trance. I’ll stare in your eyes and I’ll note the sparkle of pleasure mixed with the fear of not coming back. You’d smile. For a second I’d imagine what if I got you pregnant in that moment? Silly, right..?
Today we ought to go see the doctor, but we both agreed that you won’t. The last chemo nearly killed you, you hurt all day, more than you’ve ever hurt before, and I stood there helpless not even hugging you, for a single touch pricked your bones.
But now I had you resting on my chest. Kissing your forehead, assuring you that all will be okay. I’d tell you that I love you and you’d tell me that you love me too. We’ve always been in love.
Laying there on bed, our fingers would trim like lovers who had just experienced their first encounter. Then we’d reminisce of the first time we met. You’d laugh and say that was the most worst day of your life. But then again you’d let me tell the story for I tell it best. And usually it starts with, I walked in on a stranger in a public washroom, and that stranger turned out to be you.
I’d go ahead and tell the story of our life. The highs and the lows. We’d both laugh with unfamiliar tears brewing in our eyes. And it would dawn on us how time has flown. We’d only reminisce of the good times in our youth, and each time I stopped to take a breath, you’d squeeze my hands and say that you’re lucky you met me.
Deep between the capillaries of my thoughts I’d wonder why I have to lose you at some point. That the both of us would be living in a borrowed time in which we had no say over. We had no choices but wait for the demise. It felt so cold and so wrong. How could a beautiful person with a good heart be this way?? I was so mad and I held some sort of resentment to the basic principle breathing. Because I couldn’t understand. I will never understand. I don’t want to understand. Tears filled my eyes and my heart was turning cold with bitterness, and all these feelings clouted my senses that while you laid on my chest, holding on to my hands, I never realized that you had stopped breathing. But the last words you must have said was that you loved me. And now I have to deal with your absence.
***
As written by Phill Ibsen
(Master of Descriptions)
Heart_Art_Poetics
2019
Originally published at http://phillpoet.wordpress.com on February 15, 2019.
