This Dying...

The sunlit turquoise window niche
casts a lustre of blessing
on the room where she lies...
sometimes fully here
sometimes seeming far away,
her eyes fixated on a view
I cannot see, I cannot know.
"Who touched my shoulder?" she asks-
a touch which only she can feel.
"This morning I feel great,"
her weakened voice insists,
as nailbeds cyanose and cheeks are sunken
more and more with each passing day.
It's a slow and plodding process, this dying...
a path which I will one day also walk...
and I cannot help but wonder
what's it like for her- to know that each passing day,
each passing hour, brings her that much closer
to what?- the end of all she's known...relationships
and work and love and creativity...
though in the near distance
a door is opening and those she loved and lost are beckoning
with smiles of welcome, just waiting to embrace her
and bring her to a place of light,
even as we, here in this darker place,
wave a tear-stained good bye.