WHERE DID SHE GO? (I DON’T KNOW, I DON’T KNOW, I DON’T KNOW) | Maesha Elm Elahi
The doctor tells me to watch her skin, and in it, an answer.
Her family surrounds her,
they sing about her soul on the back of a dove's wing,
they tell her they love her over and over
and it is unfair
that they must wait another 4 syringes
to be told what I have known
for the last 4 minutes -
She is already gone.
But it was not the color of her skin that gave it away because
at the head of the bed, the hospital light is a harsh white
that washes out her face.
So instead I watch her chest
as it rises and falls, again and again.
And then my gaze turns to her right wrist,
attached limply to her right hand,
held steady in his right hand,
held firmly against his chest
as it rises and falls, again and again.
He is weeping, and I cannot bear to look at his face
so instead I look at his hand holding hers
like a broken bird.
And in my inattention,
I miss her last breath.
And that is my only regret
The tiniest of griefs I will allow myself to have.
Because she is gone
and I don't know where she went.
Maesha Elm Elahi is a fourth-year medical student at the University of Alberta in Edmonton, Canada.