Lifeboat
Two calls this morning – flood of tears…
She cannot eat a single thing they give her.
Instead it’s up to us to ship it in like cargo:
bananas, sandwiches, pork pies
and now consommé soup – remember that?
These are the things that bind us now:
nutrients, vitamins –
today a crisp packet connects us.
She drains what little energy I have
with conversation: nurses and injections,
her upset stomach, losing weight
and how my presence somehow heals.
But I’m no rescuer – her ship, out here,
is unlikely to find shore before the crates run bare,
supplies exhausted, every crew member
abandoned, and the constant flares
and SOS demands slowed to a pace
of long, painful acceptance.
I just try to steer this thing
away from all the noise,
the crashing certainty of the waves.
David Van-Cauter’s pamphlet Mirror Lake is published by Arenig Press. He was runner-up in the Ver Poets Open Competition 2019. He is a personal tutor based in Hertfordshire.