Monteverde

In certain forests,
everyday’s May’s verdantly wet…
green sheen on everything.

haiku 1


If pain is to teach,
spirit enters through my wounds,
passing owl's healing.

la fe de vida

There are so many ironies in life but today’s is particularly prickling – today is “la fe de vida day” for our house. La fe de vida is a proof of life document. Once a year, my mother-in-love has to prove to the Nicaraguan Government that she is still alive so that an authorized person can collect her monthly pension and transfer it to her hands here. The purpose we suppose is to prevent the fraud of someone collecting a pension for a dead person yet whole thing is just a bit odd. Deep down we tend to think, “why can’t she just stand there and say, ‘look, pinch, or better hug me.’” But no.

So, each year she’s been here we have shuffled through the elaborate process of filling out several detailed forms, supplying yet another set of small overpriced photographs, and dropping the papeleo (paperwork) into the hands of the Nicaraguan Consulate, who review and stamp with appropriate seals, nod approval, and if paid an extra fee will have the documents ready the same afternoon for pick up. It is a considerable amount of effort on the best of days for a result of a little less than $100 per month but today it is especially hard. Today will be her be her last la fe de vida.

She has been house-bound for more than a month since the diagnosis. She is weak and strained though filled with humor and hope. And she is adamant about proving her life. It is a task we can’t do for her. She must do it herself. There are no substitutes for la fe de vida.

We have tried for weeks to convince her it is not worth the effort. Yet, in spite of her sense (she doesn’t know for sure) this will be her last la fe de vida, she is absolutely determined to make this huge expenditure of energy, push herself out of bed, dress in her best, sprit on a perfume she likes (though not the expensive one i recently brought her because “that’s for special occasions”) strap on her sandals, and scratch her walker out the door. It squeezes our hearts and burns our eyes but we go along with it. We assist as well as we can. We pull it together and pull together. Hell if she can, we should. What’s the point if not to make her pleased.

So this is today’s irony. As my mother-in-love transitions out of this form of life toward the next, she insists on getting her due and proving that she still exists and in doing so she proves for us another lesson: life is for living right up to its last moment. That’s truly the faith of life… la fe de vida.

July 28, 2009

Today my dad forgot where he had met my mother. The famous story of a dance in Miami turned into the bath house in Atlantic City but Mom was never in Atlantic City until after they were married and the bath house was long gone by then as it was a part of Pop’s childhood.

I told Pop it was ok and he said, “No, it’s not but what can I do about it.”

Signs of the disease progressing and his awareness of his inability to control it.

Part of a work in deconstruction

why can’t i remember you can’t remember?
you’ve lost the day, the clock, the word, the button.
what have i lost such that faults your loss?

the anger arises out of nothing.
but firstly i recall it’s a sign
we are losing our mind.

you grit, gnash, and teeth grind.
routine is better made
and followed, though senseless.

why can’t i remember you can’t recall?
that’s my loss within your dementia.
it appears we’ve lost more than minds.

why can’t i, ay remember,
who’s sick and who cares here?
the patient’s counting his time, & mine?

we anger as the commercial reminds us.
if you can’t decide and i can prescribe.
why remember you’re losing your mind?

not one cares that i am you and you are i.
in my heart, mind, arms, cells you’re held.
I’ll remember that what you can’t remember.