Oral pain relievers

         laying in bed,

a hospice bed.

               Favorite meals brought by

                     comers and goers.

Sadness

       pity and low voices are popular.

              Methadone given

lorazepam given

                 a walk to the downstairs bathroom for Pops and I.

        Phones ringing

              California and across the country relatives calling

                   a brother dying of cancer in California as well.

         We pretend to sleep

but,
    
    . ...       it's time for pain meds.

Higher dose of methadone hospice instructs us...

       we comply.

               A new day has dawned

and-

                    trips to the bathroom have stopped.

      Time for a catheter hospice asserts to me,

               I struggle with this decision

      do I invade my Pops even more ?

Ripping myself to shreds,

.......       I reluctantly agree.

I lie next to my Pop's bed on the floor

       dawn has yet to break,

             pounding on the handrails of death's bed is Pops....

                  I need to get the fxxk up !

       I need to *** !!!!

who the fxxk is holding me down ?!?!

             I destroy myself further for Pop's catheterization.

                  For one
hour Pops angrily pounds...

      Higher oral dosage of lorazepam hospice asserts,

               finally the pounding stops

......I break down ,

       telling my older brother that I need him to help me with this ...

              Dawn breaks and Pop's pain is a 7

              the time for ports have come....

        one in each of Pop's arms and upper thighs,

       Methadone is now morphine.

People still coming and going,

        but it's Cindy, Cathy and I that will not allow Pop's end in the hands of strangers.

              Morphine in one port

lorazepam in another...

Morphine becomes tramadol

              breaths become faint...

I lie next to Pops on the green carpeted floor.

                   End stage is over...

it's ended-

       I have lost my Daddy

the cold stethoscope tells me that my Pop's life is over....

          I am amputated limb, numb!

Questions amass from strangers

              a stretcher opens on my Pop's white ceramic tile foyer floor....

               a black body bag unzipped and my Daddy placed inside of it..............¿¿¿¿

      zipped up-

           my mind blacks out from there.

             I finally, weakly stumble to the kitchen and see all of the medications we pumped inside my Daddy.....

           it's clear that we fought hard against end stage cancer with Pops but at what cost to me.....

         for life?

Imagery never alludes me,

           it's a replay,

a broken record,

                        that will never stop,

      .....until my end days....

and this I know !