Goodnight, mom

Been a while, hasn't it.

Things came to a close, faster than light it feels.
She started losing the way home, and now not only me saw that things had to change.

So she moved to the home, where she unraveled faster than how faster than light feels.

She was lost for words, but also lost the sharp edges. Spent hours coloring away, humming along to music. Nurses said she had a will of her own, but was a really sweet lady. With me, she kept that shadow of muttering darkness and hissing curses, but then, I was fully attuned to the people in the ceiling.

But it was true, for long periods at a time, their malignant voices would be quiet.

Sometimes I thought maybe she lost the voices.

She searched for what she lost.

She put needles in her chocolate paste poking about, jammed colored pencils in a tube of hand cream, would peek in every cup, bottle or vase, behind every curtain or door. Not a cap was safe of being unscrewed and put somewhere else, while she was searching, searching.

And then she got ill, but better.
The second time around, I was wise enough to understand the people in the ceiling acted as harbingers.

The doctors started searching, but how do you ask someone who's been losing words and meanings where it hurts.

In the end (the third time around) one runs out of options, and somebody has to make the call.

I silenced the people in the ceiling.

And from time to time my body hungers. My ears want to hear her voice. My eyes want to see her laugh out loud at some joke. My arms want to squeeze her tight in a goodbye.

And as if that neuromuscular memory isn't torture enough, I keep remembering telling her: It's okay, you can go now. We'll be all right.