I can’t bear it:
This frailty.

The two of them sit together,
Comfortable and worn like old shoes.
Here husband, there wife.
She runs her knobbled hands over her scarf, saying,
“I had this made many years ago, you know. So fine it is!”
She touches it happily, the silk twisting.
The gorgeous colours of green and blue flashing.

He looks down, his tired hands knotted together.
He pulls at his woollen vest, anxiously.
His old heart fraying at the edges
In sorrow – in grief – or in humiliation he says
“We bought it yesterday, my dear. Only yesterday.”

Her watery eyes look askance, frightened, and for a second
A flash of pain is lit across her face
A bolt of terror as she knows that she does not know,
That she has forgotten, and may again forget.
“Did we? Yes?”
Every word a question, she leans towards him
She is a balloon ascending high, in rough winds
And he is her tether to the ground.
Tenuous. The tight string pulling.

Here is the mindless young waitress now.
The coffee comes: sweet relief.
The woman knows this ritual well. Tears the tiny packets open,
Lets sugar seep into froth, and sink.
And now the spoon is lifted, it stirs and stirs.
It knows its place.
Slowly the spoon is laid down neatly, across the napkin.

At my table I feel like only I can see
Her colours fading, her skin stretching
Her memories like the swirling dust motes
Lifting and falling through the autumn air, and she poised here:
In this café. On this everyday street. This everyday woman.

She gazes out the café window, listless, searching.
She pats her hair in place.
Then a long sigh – a soft escape of air – as she murmurs,
“Love, I’m thirsty.”
She plucks at his sleeve, across the red table.
Her coffee forgotten, and very soon stone cold.