The Visitor

Dead a year ago last Monday
didn't cry to the following
Sunday.
I thought about one day,
hours from her death
when I ran away.
The doctor said she took a fall.
She was shrieking-my mother
who endured pain for me and with me.
I could hear her moans before I stood
in front of her hospital door.
I moved only my head to see her
 as they circled me to show their
own sympathetic, worried faces as
they told me she had fallen in the night.
I turned and scurried, stumbling,
frantic to push out the double doors.
I regret not running in to her room.
Perhaps, I think, if I placed my hand
 on her forehead, or held her hand
if she was cognizent, it could have
lessened her fear or made her pain
bearable; just knowing she wasn't alone.
Instead I bolted in the opposite direction.
Crying, making phone calls to help lessen my pain.
Now, forevermore I will remember
my self-focused action that day
that visit me today.