Confinement

This one needs a little bio.

A year and a half ago my mother was rushed to surgery with a stomach anyeurism, the same night that my father had been taken into hospital for surgery. I flew back to Northern Ireland immediately, and went to the hospital to see them both. Each level in the Royal Victoria has an icon to help identify it. When I came out of the lift on my dad's floor, the first thing I stepped on was the icon - a labyrinth. Those who know me know what an important symbol that is for me, and I took it as a sign from God that - whatever might happen - it's all held in God's care. We sat by mum's bed in intensive care for weeks, and it took 6 months for her to get home. But she made it. She really is a trooper.

I wrote this during those long suspenseful days of waiting.



Confinement

We cannot confine this time.
It seeps like a wound
still raw at the seams;
worn red from weeping.

We wait with the others in line
‘til sharply summoned
to enter the temple of dreams
where spent gods lie sleeping.

We study the scene for a sign
of a miracle in the round;
for we are powerless it seems
in this vigil we’re keeping.

We establish a rhythm and rhyme
to our days, but have found
that it’s useless. None of our schemes
can stem mortality’s creeping.

Our soul-ache defies anodyne.
On this course we are bound;
and yet, cradled. A symbol redeems:
the labyrinth foreshadows safe-keeping.