Unconditional Love from 1943 - an Elegy for Nan

Last week my Nan decided it was time

to sign off for good on the dotted line,

and while her carer’s call was sad, indeed

condolences are just so hard to read:

‘She’s finally at peace.’ ‘It’s for the best.’

‘She’s no longer in pain.’ ‘She’s now at rest.’

And worst by far is, ‘You can now move on.’

Such words are meant to comfort, now she’s gone,

but I don’t want to move on anywhere!

She was my Nan, I want to feel despair.

Her living room is as it’s always been,

the faded olive carpet vacuumed clean,

her stick’s still hooked over the fire grate,

her favourite chair with plumped cushions awaits

the carriage clock’s chime from the mantle piece

but its hand movements also slowed and ceased.

Frozen in this hushed, suspended silence

time is paused in circumspect defiance.

You’d think that Nan’s popped out to make some tea,

that any moment she’ll be back with me.

I used to sit with her when I was young,

she’d ask about my days at school among

my friends, and how my half-term tests had been

and how my teachers were, and school routine.

Then we would look through photographs and smile

at my Great Uncle John, dressed in such style,

and her giggling sisters. Then my young Nan

herself, so full of life and of life’s plans

waved through the lens from 1943.

Though twelve years old, she was waving to me.

Each month I would visit my Nan at home,

or send warmest greetings over the phone.

Now family occasions through the year

will never feel the same as she’s not here.

Hardest will be her birthday in July,

when midsummer’s dry warmth lights up the skies.

Soon sadly her things will be packed away,

and I’ll no longer need to go to stay,

and strangers will live in her house instead,

you see, it’s for the living not the dead.

So, I’ve resolved on something I must do

to cherish Nan, and our memories too.

From time to time when I’m feeling downcast

I’ll sit alone and delve into the past.

Great Uncle John will still smile back at me,

and Nan’s sisters will always laugh with glee.

Something I know I can rely upon –

and draw love unconditionally from –

is Nan’s warmth radiating back to me

in that photo from 1943.

Penny Authors are including this poem in their latest printed anthology, V9 Book of Lived.