{"id":6192,"date":"2022-09-02T22:04:00","date_gmt":"2022-09-02T22:04:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/farefwd.com\/?p=6192"},"modified":"2022-09-30T21:35:18","modified_gmt":"2022-09-30T21:35:18","slug":"quality-of-life","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/farefwd.com\/index.php\/2022\/09\/02\/quality-of-life\/","title":{"rendered":"Quality of Life"},"content":{"rendered":"\t\t
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Quality of Life<\/h2>\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/section>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/section>\n\t\t\t\t
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By Patricia L. Hamilton\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

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Seeing my mother<\/p>

curled in on herself<\/p>

like a spiral shell<\/p>

on a bed with a metal side-rail<\/p>

was like hearing the high wail<\/p>

of a far-off ambulance<\/p>

late at night, its keening<\/p>

faint yet persistent.<\/p>

\u00a0<\/p>

The rise and fall<\/p>

of her chest barely visible,<\/p>

her body\u2019s memory seemed<\/p>

to beckon her back to a womb,<\/p>

but that icy hospital room<\/p>

was a poor replica<\/p>

of the warm, dark safety<\/p>

of her first home.<\/p>

\u00a0<\/p>

I spoke to her,<\/p>

hoping she would wake,<\/p>

but she was wandering<\/p>

dream-meadows, elsewhere.<\/p>

Bereft, I could only stare<\/p>

at her spindle-thin legs,<\/p>

her pale skin translucent<\/p>

as rice paper.<\/p>

\u00a0<\/p>

I took it all in:<\/p>

the stark white sheets,<\/p>

the fetal curl, the fragile bones,<\/p>

the shallow breath.<\/p>

The shadow of death,<\/p>

I realized, had begun to edge<\/p>

across the late afternoon<\/p>

of her remaining days.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>

\u00a0<\/p>

In that moment \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>

I grasped the meaning<\/p>

of the phrase I’d often heard.<\/p>

Her body might, for a time, uncurl,<\/p>

but all too soon she’d furl<\/p>

her bird-like limbs for good,<\/p>

fold her gnarled hands, let go<\/p>

a last, regretful sigh.<\/p><\/div>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/section>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/section>\n\t\t\t\t

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\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t
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Patricia L. Hamilton<\/strong> is a professor of English in Jackson, TN. She is the author of\u00a0<\/em>The Distance to Nightfall\u00a0(Main Street Rag Publishing). She won the 2015 and 2017 Rash Award in Poetry and has received three Pushcart nominations. She has new work forthcoming in\u00a0<\/em>The Windhover\u00a0and\u00a0<\/em>Broad River Review.<\/em><\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/section>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/section>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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