Exit

Examine, explain, example, explore
Circling with my pencil, on the floor.
My mothers fingers counting every heart beat.
"Don't try to feed him, he can't really eat"

That's what the nurses said
Don't bother with dinner, he's mostly dead.
He needed that meatloaf, potatoes and corn,
And when he was done, the pride he'd worn

"Look Dad, I ate all my dinner."
Victorious, in his last hours still a winner.
He talked about finding the stairway to heaven.
Exalt, exude, exist, I'd neatly circled seven.

"Come here, front and center" he beckoned to me,
He looked small and broken, like a fallen tree.
That paper wrapped skeleton barely touching the bed,
I wish I could remember the things he said.

I remember the whiteness and smell of that place.
He held my hand and smiled with simple grace.
I kissed his forehead and rubbed his cheek.
This ornery strong man, sunken and weak.

Extinct, expose, exclude, excite,
His skin like chalk dust, smooth and white.
I told myself "Be strong, don't cry",
I had never seen someone I loved die.

I watched my brother pass to some other shore,
When her fingertips couldn't hold him anymore.
She truly believed if she counted this way
Somehow she could keep him from dying that day.

extol, exclaim, extrapolate,
Words searches and counting heartbeats, these I hate.