Wandering

The doctors want my mom to stay in the rehabilitation facility for one more week so she can continue daily physical therapy. She seems okay with that, even though the food sucks. My sister and I have been bringing her deli sandwiches and steak dinners. I'm surprised how adaptive my mom is being. She seems okay with being there. Maybe she knows it's helping her.

Fortunately, the staff is great. And my mom has a nice garden view out of her window. She's also pleased with her roommate because my mom doesn't like idle chitchat, which her roomate's not capable of. And the roommates's hardly in the room anyway since she has dementia and sits in her wheelchair at the nurse's station most of the day so they can keep an eye on her. She tends to wander off when not watched.

And now I will wander off to a new topic: I teach my writing workshop out of my house tonight. I'm going to start with the following James Wright poem, one of my favorites:

A Blessing

by James Wright

Just off the highway to Rochester, Minnesota,
Twilight bounds softly forth on the grass.
And the eyes of those two Indian ponies
Darken with kindness.
They have come gladly out of the willows
To welcome my friend and me.
We step over the barbed wire into the pasture
Where they have been grazing all day, alone.
They ripple tensely, they can hardly contain their happiness
That we have come.
They bow shyly as wet swans. They love each other.
There is no loneliness like theirs.
At home once more,
They begin munching the young tufts of spring in the darkness.
I would like to hold the slenderer one in my arms,
For she has walked over to me
And nuzzled my left hand.
She is black and white,
Her mane falls wild on her forehead,
And the light breeze moves me to caress her long ear
That is delicate as the skin over a girl's wrist.
Suddenly I realize
That if I stepped out of my body I would break
Into blossom.