Author's note:
.....At my mother's bedside...just before her death...February 2001...South Bend, IN.
*
*
When raging fever wracked my body
Who caressed my aching head
Before I learned to feed myself
Who saw to it that I was fed
Though she needs my help this morning
...There is nothing I can do...
To ease such dreadful suffering
...You've seen fit...to put her through
May I remind You...of my childhood
....Oh...It seems...just yesterday
Family gatherings....around Your altar
...It was she....who led the way
Now..in her name...I beg forgiveness
...Deemed transgressions...whatever sin
This...the child....of all those Sundays
...Thank You Lord...Dear God...Amen
“The suspense: the fearful, acute suspense: of standing idly by while the life of one we dearly love, is trembling in the balance; the racking thoughts that crowd upon the mind, and make the heart beat violently, and the breath come thick, by the force of the images they conjure up before it; the desperate anxiety to be doing something to relieve the pain, or lessen the danger, which we have no power to alleviate; the sinking of soul and spirit, which the sad remembrance of our helplessness produces; what tortures can equal these; what reflections of endeavours can, in the full tide and fever of the time, allay them! ”
? Charles Dickens
James B. Earley
http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/oh-it-seems-just-yesterday/