Her Long Illness

Here are words by another man. A poet named Donald Hall. This poem is called "Her long illness". It is somewhat sad, but sweet it the same instant. I love this poem, and I hope you will enjoy it as much as I have.

Her Long Illness.

Daybreak until nightfall,
he sat by his wife at the hospital
while chemotherapy dripped
through the catheter into her heart.
He drank coffee and read
the Globe.  He paced; he worked
on poems; he rubbed her back
and read aloud.  Overcome with dread,
they wept and affirmed
their love for each other, witlessly,
over and over again.
When it snowed one morning Jane gazed
at the darkness blurred
with flakes.  They pushed the IV pump
which she called Igor
slowly past the nurses' pods, as far
as the outside door
so that she could smell the snowy air.