for Dean Lewis 

I didn’t find a way.
To say goodbye, that is,
but they left anyway –
my mother as I struggled
to hurry my feeble
and uncooperative father 
into the car so we could get 
to the hospital
while there was still time.
My father only 
a few months afterward
as I stood without my siblings
at his bedside
knowing he had grown
too deaf to hear anything
I might have thought to say.
It’s been twenty years.
I no longer believe 
there actually is a way 
to say goodbye.   

Vera S. Scott


Written this morning as a reflection of the emotions captured by Dean Lewis in his amazing song How Do I Say Goodbye.
A reel of this was posted to TikTok:      https://www.tiktok.com/t/ZTRQsVKqc/