HOLDING HANDS

Songs that make one cry for d’verse.

I reach for Sandy’s hand when she was tiny. It is unusual for Sandy not to be smiling.

 

HOLDING   HANDS

(Bridge Over Troubled Waters)

There’s the bridge to nowhere

but I’ll take the bridge to everywhere:

and I did, like it or not.

We all did, the prayer chains set up.

Two days before we knew

what your diagnosis was.

You’d been struck with meningitis.

 

I could not move.

All I could do was pray.

Kia Kaha,

you fought through;

heroic, a miracle.

 

I seek simple words,

words that don’t exaggerate.

They, though are the ones

that hurt the most.

 

There was now another person

on this bridge of all bridges …

it was me. A simple procedure

for a stent but the inserting

wire broke; it was retrieved

not easily.

 

Mother and daughter now

in the same hospital ward.

We took that main bridge,

your journey much much deeper

than mine.

 

Now on the other side

we grasp hands. Let us

walk across the footbridge

of return, meet

hold hands together. We

are strong. Kia Kaha.

 

Benita H. Kape (c) 5.6.2019

 

The Story — May has been the most dreadful month. But June sees us both home and slowly recovering. I cannot tell you of the full extent of it for Sandy. Complete deafness in one ear, the loss of the tops (to the first knuckle) on most of her fingers. She died twice and they got her back. For me it was a 4 hour operation to retrieve the broken wire. Unbelievable pain, unbelievable kindness along the way.

I have always loved Simon and Garfunkel singing “Bridge Over Troubled Waters”. The resonance of that sound they give fit my feelings for this poem.

 

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