still

your hands are still now
skin thin like parchment and rings on fingers
curling inward
holding nothing but themselves.

(you used to hold my hand when I was little)

your eyes are blank now
lashless lids over a paler blue than I remember
looking outward and seeing nothing
or inward and everything.

(you used to wear glasses)

your hair is white now
grey gone the way of memory but still
falling in girlish waves washed
by strangers.

(you used to wind my curls around your finger)

your voice is silent now
hushed by the rush of air through the tubes
in your face and the race of the drugs through
the needed needles in your leg. every two hours.

(you used to tell me stories)

go
go now
go and be free
you are loved
you are
still