An Imponderable

I had a little friend who left too soon. Acute leukemia struck at age five. His mind was so blindingly bright. This earth could not give it room. He had questions in endless supply. Every answer quickened another query About stars, earthworms, seasons. Even some adults struggled to reply. In that era nothing could be done. He was hospitalized for passive care. I visited him one bleak, broken day. His mother was sobbing for her son. Losing a child—name a thing as bad. I cannot conceive the anguish of it. I cannot harbor a hurt so severe. Years later grief drove the father mad. And if perchance I meet the mother A decade beyond her child’s death. Seeing me opens an unhealed wound And she tries fresh tears to smother. His name was Brent, I see him yet Dressed in all white in his casket. I wonder at the why of his passing. I wonder if God should a child forget.