Diana Darby ** "I V" ** Intravenous

Saturday Afternoon

Saturday afternoon.
She is crying.
She says she wants to leave
Denver
and move down South.
She says she loves her daughter
but doesn’t know what to do.
She doesn’t like the cold.
Her skin can’t take it.
She says she hates where she is.
She feels like she is in prison.
There,
on the 6th floor,
in her two-bedroom apartment,
with the doors closed,
watching the snow come down,
while my father watches T.V. all day.
She sounds so pathetic,
and alone,
crying and praying for me.
I try to come up with ideas to help her:
Work on her art.
Walk-up and down the halls.
Practice one of her workbooks.
Go visit one of the women who lives in her building.
But she doesn’t feel like doing any of those things.
She says she doesn’t think she’s going to live much longer.
And I don’t know what to do.
I understand how she feels,
locked away,
unable to get free,
unable to flourish,
or find her way to where she is supposed to be.
I want to help her,
but the truth is
I don’t know how to help either one of us.
She never taught me the way out.
She never gave me the map,
the rules,
the book.
Now,
I feel as blind and helpless as she does,
I’m just thirty years behind.