The Last Time I Saw Her

The Last Time I Saw Her

I’ll never forget 4:45am as long as I live,

those were the numbers on the clock

when my sister came into my bedroom:

“Jay, mom passed away.”

Even though I knew it was coming

I didn’t see it coming.

 

As I walked over to her bedroom

I felt a sickness in my stomach.

I had just requested of God that night

that He would take her in her sleep,

but there’s still an unexplainable

resistance to his answer to my prayer.

You want it and you dread it.

 

I walked over to her lifeless face

and rubbed her still-warm cheeks while

kissing her cooling forehead whispering:

“You’re finally with Jesus, Mom.”

I was so stunned I couldn’t even cry.

I just sat there staring at her still body.

 

Then I had a reaction that was almost reflexive.

I grabbed her head and straightened it

centering it on the propped up pillows

so that as Rigor Mortis set in

her body would be positioned perfectly.

I knew there wasn’t an open casket

to postpone my final time of being with her,

she was going to be cremated,

so this vision of her would be the last

We saw of her meaningful remains.

 

The earthen vessel that carried the treasure.

 

I went into the bathroom 

and prepared a hot washcloth

to wash her face, wipe around her mouth,

comb out her tangled hair,

and clean and straighten her eye lashes.

As her body stiffened, her mouth closed

making her face look more and more

Like the mother we knew and loved.

Her skin wasn’t ashen like dad’s,

It was a beautiful olive brown,

Like she’d put on some fancy makeup.

 

I kept going in like a mortician

Pursing her lips, aligning her eyebrows,

Matching the closure of her eyelids,

And rubbing her skin to stretch it into place.

I wanted her to look the best I could

Before we said our final goodbyes.

 

When I’d done all I could do,

I wept at her bedside like a little boy.

“There was no one like you, Mom.”

I kept saying that over and over again

as I played with her thinning hair

and leaned down to kiss her 

on the hand and then on the head,

Back and forth.

 

As they finally rolled her out on the gurney,

my brother and sisters, her children,

gathered around her elevated body.

I had my cry already, but I let my siblings

weep and wail their final groans and words.

As we looked upon her face one last time,

I prayed to her Creator, our God,

and entrusted her body and spirit

back to the One who had lent them to us.

 

That was the last time I would ever see her.