Fully Blessed

— for amv

Child of three, climbed
on to grandfather in his wheelchair
flung arms around him, squeezed
him, kissed him. For her, he pursed his lips
craned his neck, kissed back. Movements stolen
by stroke, returned in fleeting moments.

Aunty May! I saw God! He spoke to me!
She runs into the house, eyes wide,
face alight, ecstatic. What did God say to you?
God said: Everyone is blessed, but Grandpa is
fully blessed. In that instant, my mind, like a rope
pulled tense from striving, became a hammock.

Three years after the stroke, for reasons
we may never know, his body stiffened,
became like a log that could not be bent,
could not even sit. Could only lie there,
back at the bottom of the mountains
of rehab he had conquered.

Now five, she consoled, advised: Don’t worry,
Grandpa. Your mother and father are here.
Your brother is here. Grandpa Ernest
is also here. You can see them if you look
properly. I can see because I look
with my heart. The heart can see, you know.

She wrote a poem for stiffness,
for softness. A friend visiting with his guitar,
sang her words turning poem into lullaby.
Cuddle in the clouds
Angels send their love
To you, to you, to you.

Forty days in the hospital — agonising
for him, heart-wrenching
for us. But today — he is home,
sitting up, in his bed, in his own clothes,
in his cool, room.

He has an extension fitted tightly on his right arm,
a head-thrown-back extension, a laughing extension,
holding up a paper, pointing, telling the story
of the large, kaleidoscopic butterfly she’s drawn
flying above ‘Welcome Home, Grandpa!’

There’s a sparkle in his eyes. This same man
was three times at the edge of death
and fought his way back each time.

When she was tiny, she jumped into the car
to appointments with his Osteopath,
stayed with him in his room while he did
his physical exercises on many days, for many years,
watching us, helping me, encouraging him.

Young girl now ten: “Aunty May, what if we rolled
a small towel, put it into Grandpa’s hand
for him to hold? It will be soft, so it won’t hurt.
Slowly we can put two towels, then three. Maybe his hands
will one day open again.” Later his therapists suggest the same.

One day: Aunty May, do you know
how Grandpa will be healed? It sounds as if
she has been contemplating the question for years.
Tell me. I know my long-searched-for answer is about to come.
If we all love him enough.

Evening comes. We set off for our neighbourhood walk,
a one-kilometre circular route just outside our home. Ten years
go by: she sits on his lap, she walks beside him;
chatting, laughing; she pushes the wheelchair, sometimes
she goes ahead on her scooter.

He practises standing along a quiet stretch. Puppies come
to say hello. She is delighted but thrilled about something else.
Her grandpa is making a movement she has not seen before:
as he is standing, holding the walking frame, he is shoeing
them away with his foot.