My wife by Ken Wheatcroft-Pardue

is always dying in some hospital somewhere, miles from home.
I am always rushing to get ready: taking showers, shaving,
walking the dog. Then through ground fog and indifferent
traffic I make my way on arterial, meandering roads I barely

recognize to spend a few hours watching TV (old sit-coms
in the main), reading aloud to her her favorite books, chatting
with nurses and techs, sitting in always uncomfortable hospital
chairs guaranteed to cause future back pains. I am always failing

her – getting there too late, or not staying late enough to catch the
ones who don't give a damn. Or, being too distracted by my phone
or just a bone-weariness – lo, these many months – that's numbed me.
Yet another night, she has trouble sleeping. She knows she is dying.

We hold hands, recite our good times like a benediction: our wonderful
daughter, our happy 30 years, camping in Colorado, Arkansas, New
Mexico, our trips to New York, Santa Fe, Asheville. Finally, her meds
kick in and she calms. I kiss her goodnight. Tell her I love her. Turn out

the light. Outside, streetlights lit, roads shorn of traffic, I drive through
ice and snow, through thunderous light shows, my hood peppered by hail,
or nights eerily calm, a sharp contrast to our roiled life. Once home, I walk
the dog, read till I fall asleep in my La-Z-Boy, wake up at two, muddle-headed.

Walk spraddle-legged, like an old man, to sleep fitfully, coiling alone
in what was once our bed.



Ken Wheatcroft-Pardue has had poems published in The Texas Observer, Concho River Review, Borderlands, California Quarterly, and two anthologies of Texas poetry. His collection of poetry What I Did Not Tell You (Hungry Buzzard Press) was published in the fall of 2020.