Frictions

Her brain is dying,
The body, too.
It must do the brain’s bidding. 
That bidding will cease.

How long?
Nobody knows
The duration of this death sentence,
Except that it is slow and eliminative

My thoughts collide, frictions spark and singe.

I want her to die soon:
Her pain gone, no more need for earthly care.
Heaven at last.

I want her to live:
She’d be gone, beyond my earthy care.
Never to return to me here.
Heaven would separate us even more than dementia.

Life would be simpler when she dies.
Life would be more miserable when she dies,
Just more agony in another key.

If she dies soon,
We won’t burn through all our money.
My fear of substandard care for her over.
I hate thinking this,
But heavy is the concern.
And Ecclesiastes says, “Money answers everything.”
--except happiness in the face of death.
She handled the money.
Now she can barely handle a spoon.

I feed her, and feel close.
I feed her, and feel despair.

These frictions,
Bone on bone.
Life on life.
Life against life.
Sparks fly upward,
Born for trouble…
Until trouble is no more.