Emily isn’t her real name.

Emily isn’t her real name.

I introduced her to our medical student on Friday.

She is rake-thin,

with wizened skin

From almost a century of cigarettes,

She shuffles from room to room on a dusty walker,

Her mobility scooter

askew

In the corner of her room.

I’ve mentioned her before,

She of the parakeet

Coco.

Now deceased.

I said,

She used to have a bird, Coco, now dead.

That’s a shame, said the student, although I am relieved

She continued, I’m terrified of birds.

And the conversation,

The moments in time that morning,

The stillness of the late winter air,

We discussed recent events of Emily’s life.

Her recent falls

Her near-death first-wave Covid,

Her dizziness,

Aches and pains,

Struggle for breath.

She is a survivor,

A crenelated being who is built to last.

And I think,

Had she died,

two years ago,

As so many did,

This conversation would never have happened,

She would had moved into incinerator dust,

Only the memories of those who knew her

at the back of the minds,

Her story would have vanished

Another old woman

Would now be

Zimmering through the tiny bungalow,

And I,

What would I have?

Not those moments,

Not this.

It would have been an un-ocurred sadness,

I flicker in time and other things.