Mother and Sister By Cancer Claimed

In those timeless seconds before death

The spirit often moves the wasted form

And in the moment of the final breath

To a higher power body does conform.

I've witnessed acts of love beyond compare.

Consider this, my mother's wasted frame

Her body rigid, her pain too great to bear.

As she cried for Demerol I came

Injected her and gave her brief release,

Then oxygen and watched her failing breath

As she began to fade and the disease

Now rampant claimed her soul for death.

But she refused to yield to the great Shade

Impossibly turned her head to see her love

And smiled on him, calm and unafraid

Then fearlessly into the darkness dove.

Uncontrollably her family wept,

I lifted the apparatus from her face

And in an instant changed to calm there leapt

On us the miracle of healing Grace.

A perfume filled that sacred atmosphere

So powerful and sweet its scent of peace.

An ancient soul had passed, no further tear

Was shed, absolved she granted us release.

My sister's death was fought on a grim field

Where Death supreme matched her iron will

And ate at her when she refused to yield;

On she fought, a heart that would not still.

The nurses could not believe that she could last

So many days in throes of agony

How could a heart so long to earth hold fast

Or joy of life delay her destiny?

To her the final hour swiftly came

And Death's deep bell within her bosom tolled

And still she would not go, so great the flame

Of love that in Death's stranglehold

She laboured through an endless night of pain

Father, brother, remaining by her side,

To see her one beloved once again.

He came, she looked at him and died.