Your Last Visit

YOUR LAST VISIT

You did not tell us you were sick.

We were walking.

You fell behind. It was nothing, you said.

But I noticed. I saw.

But I also listened to you as your dismissive hand
waved away my concern.

Perhaps it was your way of acknowledging that
the verdict was already in, that
a curtain had come down.

We all carried on, us in front, you behind,
each of us in our separate realities,
each of us travelling beyond.

And then not long after you had returned home,
word came that you were truly gone.

I could have heeded what I saw.

I could have fallen back with you.
We could have walked together.
We could have had a moment.

But we did have a moment, you say.

Yes, but it was not a heeded moment,
a truly shared moment,
a communion moment.

Rather, it was a moment of separate realities
on your last visit.

An author and historian, Patrick Wolfe lives in Victoria, British Columbia, Canada.

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Your Last Visit