Marilyn

I

It's time now
for me to face
images that still
haunt my nightmares.

And to open the
floodgates of my tears
to cleanse myself
of some pain,
but not to forget,
never to forget,
what happened.

Has it really been
nearly four yours
since my Aunt Marilyn died?

Strange,
the images come
to me crystal clear
without any struggle
at all.

II

NO! I won't start
in this manner.

This poem can't
be all dark.
That would never
honor my Aunt Marilyn
or her memory.

Here's a found memory
of a time after my birth
so long ago.

It's a good way
to start this section--
a glimpse of light
that illuminates the way
in which I travel.

This memory was the
one thing Marilyn and I
seem to always talk about
every time we met.

Oh well,
I may as well
write about it.

I still feel 
slightly embaressed
even after all these years. . . .
It seems that Marilyn
was changing my diaper
and being a baby boy
when I had to go, I went.

A perfect shot
right into her face
that golden stream.

Of course, I apologized
every time we talked
about it but inside
I was laughing.

Another memory concerns
when she lived close
to my house and I
would walk over
just for visits.

I felt welcomed,
and we talked
of things in our lives.

Of such memories
are the lights made
which illuminates
the darkness
in my soul
as I walk this path.

III

January 1993,
during semester break,
just before school started
back in session.

Into the heart
of darkness 
I now walk.

Facing my fears--
and myself.

Into a place I
dread to travel. . .
where I keep fears
that are a part of me
and yet I don't claim.

It's all implanted
in the darkest corner
where the light is
dim and sickly.

We walk alone there,
but in mine there's
worse things than death
hidden away.

IV

January 1993
which really marks
a beginning--

Of hope,
of peace,
of a brand new year. . .

But not this time around.

A sudeen illness
fell my aunt
in the prime of
her life when
another grand baby
was on the way.

Sopmething small,
igsignificant in its way.

But it was something very deadly
as a blood vessel
burst deep inside her brain.

Three days we waited
sitting in intensive care.
The famiy together again
on such a tragic occurence.

We waited, watched
talked of memories.

And on short visits
we watched her body
hooked up to machines
keeping her "alive".

I watched, listened
spread comfort
as I always do . . .
even there watching
time creep by.

Saying last good-byes
crying when tears came
checking on her girls.

Seeing to their needs
in what ways I could.

Three days of waiting
throughout the days
until the test to
determine if she
was brain-dead
and her life ended
on this plane.

The doctors told us
once the plug had
been pulled death
would come calmly,
serenely in her sleep.

It was Tammy's
(the eldest daughter)
and Crystal's
(her sister)
shared decision to let
death come if
the test proved 
brain-death.

It came back
the way it should,
and after final matters
the plug was pulled.

Death
was anything
but peaceful
and graceful.

Death rushed in
and claimed her instantly
after three days
of forcing air
into a corpse.

V

To say the least
the darkness claimed
this memory.

The darkest corner
of my soul claimed it,
this new born fear.

Not of death--
that is natural,
that is pure,
that is holy.

This fear goes
to the level beyond:

To be kept alive
by damnable machines--
against the
natural order of life,
to have the last
dignity of death
denied by doctors.

VI

Marilyn,
I miss you still.
What ever damage
your unnatural death
caused has lessen
with time.

After all,
nearly four years
has passed by.

I miss your smile
at the family reunions.
It's a smile I see again
inside your grandchildren.

Marilyn
you brought
light, joy, happiness
inside my soul . . .
where your memory
lives forever.


In memory:  Marilyn Fay Deffendall
October 26, 1946 - January 8, 1993