I Wish
I Wish
I wish I remember how your face lit up with your smile, the corners of your eyes wrinkled with your grin more than the sight of your face contorted with pain.
I wish I remember the tenderness of your voice and your sweet laughter more than its tremors, your groans, cries and screams, amidst the silence of night.
I wish I remember your gentle touch, your warm caresses and reassuring embraces more than your limp arms, unable to lift and grasp anything, like holding onto life.
I wish I remember the radiance of your skin, the twinkle in your eyes and the blush of your cheeks more than your gaunt appearance, paper skinned shell of a body with hollow and yellow eyes.
I wish I remember the fragrance of your hair, the softness of your dark locks more than its dryness and most of all its absence.
I wish I remember your strength and vigour more than your defencelessness and surrender to death’s slow embrace.
I wish I wasn’t so helpless, that you also weren’t so resigned in letting the inevitable become an immediate reality.
I wish that I wasn’t relieved when you breathed your last, knowing that your pain has ended yet ours has just began.
I wish that you fought harder knowing that we fought for you, so you could have lived longer.
I wish you remembered me when you drew your last breath, so that the last words you could have told me was “I love you” than “who are you.”
I wish I didn’t remember you this way, that my memories of you are of the good days when you were free from pain, simply living not merely existing.
I wish my memories were filtered - the rotten ones discarded, the best ones preserved.
I wish my brain had locks, so my memories of you will never fade, that my human frailty will never steal them from me.
I wish I’ll never have to lose someone to the throes of death caused by this thieving bastard’s hands.
I wish cancer will never steal anything and anyone from me - all the happiness, hope and wonder of living.
I wish for a lot of things but most of all, I wish that I will never have to wish these things again.
Once is enough.
