A Stillpoint

 

My father reclines in his wheelchair,

Listing to the right, one slipper eschew,

Alone in his room, waiting

Behind a closed door.

 

It has taken months for his nursing home

To break out of its outbreak,

To vaccinate, isolate and test,

To update, report and consult.

 

New protocols are in place.

New questions are now asked

And answers recorded, PPE donned,

Test results shown, temperature taken.

 

Then I watch the same old outdated yet

Newly mandated videos on PPE,

And washing hands and then I’m handed

A new list of Do’s and Don’t’s to read. Later.

 

The plan for drop off and pick up at

The unit door is explained and repeated.

Should we synchronize our watches?

Have a contingency plan?

 

Gown, mask and face shield in place,

I follow my escort through the halls,

Remembering not to touch anything,

Smiling behind my mask at residents.

 

I walk the last hundred yards alone after

Promising to go straight to his room.

Do not pass Go. Do not collect $200.

A nurse asks me who I am visiting.

 

I ask if he’s in his room but she doesn’t know.

I look down the hall and see the closed door

Of his room.  Now I need help.

I have no protocol for closed doors.

 

She escorts me to the door and knocks.

I am allowed in for our one-hour visit

And there he is two and a half months

Older than when I last saw him.

 

My father reclines in his wheelchair

Listing to the right, one slipper eschew.

I lean down and tell him who I am

Yelling from behind my mask and shield.

 

I ask the nurse for the headset with the mic

So that he can hear me.

She goes off in search of this gadget

That will make conversation possible.

 

Soon she returns, sets it up, adjusts the volume,

And like magic, he can hear my voice

And answer from within the dementia,

Blessedly clear this morning.

 

There is not too much to say,

And so, I turn on his music on my device;

Handel’s Messiah, the traditional version,

The one that he prefers.

 

Then Bach’s St. Matthew’s Passion

Since Easter is approaching.

But he can’t recognize it now and

Doesn’t think it really is Bach.

 

Bach’s Goldberg Variations is next.

Yes, he acknowledges that is Bach

And Glenn Gould is the pianist.

Today my father remembers him.

 

Remembers that he died thirty years ago,

Remembers that he liked to hum along.

“There was a wrong note there,” he says

“Did you hear it?”

 

“No,” I admit, chuckling to myself.

“There are rather a lot of notes.”

We talk about ¾ time and 4/4 time

His lips silently count out the time signature.

 

Major chords ordered and safe,

Minor chords acknowledging sadness,

Slowly, carefully played notes and

Bursts of bustling frenetic energy.

 

This is where the father I knew

Still lives and knows and relates.

The language of music is the one

That allows us to communicate.

 

It is as though time has stood still

Here in this tiny, sparse, sterile room.

Chaos and complexity swirl around us.

But for this one hour we find a still point.

 

It is just Bach and Gould,

My father and I,

And the voice of a piano

Connecting us to Everything.