When it happens, you let it happen

My aunt gave me this command
asked “Can you handle this?”

I lied and told her yes,
and pulled up a chair,

and watched my babcia breathe
in and out and in and out and in.

My aunt came back,
and we sat for hours.

My partner brought food,
and we sat vigil, pausing at times,

to see if the breathing had stopped.
Years later, I sit alone at her bedside.

The ceremony is the same, but substantially different.
Previously she would be the one to foresight,

“It will be eight hours”
And now, it is me telling me mother,

“She won’t last until tomorrow.”
Wrapped in plastic, I hold her fever.

I chant meditations to her,
“you have nothing else to do,

Nowhere else to be,
Just right here,

Right now.”
I tell her I get it now,

Why she sent me away before because I wasn’t ready then.
I tell her I am now.

I promise, I can handle it.
If and only if so this way, she does not die alone.

And as her breathing accelerates,
I grab her hand one final time.

I tell her loud enough any God within earshot can hear,
“I love you”

And she exhales
and her body

lets go.