(Small note: This is a Sestina.)
Howling wind echoes endlessly throughout the sterile room,
plastering glitter filled raindrops against the window pane.
The young girl glides silently to the glass, her head bowed to hide her tears.
She turns her back to the withering body in the bed, what is left of her beloved father
is now in the seemingly incapable hands of one confused doctor.
No one - not her mother, brother, or grandmother can console the terrified daughter.
The bustling staff and family members offer escape to the daughter,
their goal to ease her suffering while she waits soundlessly in the cold room.
The ailment is unknown, a ghost like plague tormenting the doctor.
Moans and whimpers fill the air, sounds all too common and increasingly unwelcome. The pain
suffocates all who stand near, a thick cloak of agony enveloping the father.
Weeping, sniffling, cries soon flood four sharp corners with tears.
The girl has not left for weeks, tears
create new patterns in the grungy garments worn by the daughter.
She will not go home, she will not go to class – refusing to waste time with her father.
She does not know how long they have together, trapped in this mystifyingly spotless room.
The walls constantly constrict, stifling all hope that his pain
will disappear as all nightmares do with time. The doctor
claims that it will fade, but what is the worth of the doctor?
Why can't he save her best friend? Why don't her tears
spur him into action? It is unbearable, the tearing and ripping out of your heart sort of pain.
They all feel it, smothering them until they are nothing more than a cold carcass. The daughter
most of all. This man, her father, is her one and only companion. This pale room
takes him farther and farther from her reach. This shriveling shell, her father.
He still tries to smile, to joke, to be the old self she knew him to be. "Father,"
she would occasionally say, "just rest for one more day." Meanwhile, the doctor
devoured journals as if they were the only sustenance available in his room.
The girl waters her father with her tears,
wishing him to grow strong like the flowers in their home's garden. The daughter
stared, watching rain pour from the sky and slam into the ground. Pain.
She thinks only of how death looms overhead, drumming her fingers against the window pane.
She distracts herself this way, listening to the beat instead of her father's
groans. She doesn't know how to help, she wishes she could. "What a horrible daughter"
she thinks to herself. Finally, when all hope seems lost, the doctor
barges in with a triumphant mask hiding the dark circles beneath his eyes. The room
holds its breath, waiting for the news with eyes frozen from dripping icicle tears.
"It is the kidney!" exclaims the doctor, relief disintegrating his exhausted tears.
The room filling with the collective release of pain.
The daughter will not lose her father.
