In Break Formation

In Break Formation The indications used to come like movie fighter planes in break formation, one by one, the perfect plummet, down and out. This time they’re slower. But after supper, when I hear her in the kitchen hum again, hum higher, higher, till my ears are numb, I remember how it was the last time: how she hummed to Aramaic peaks, flung supper plates across the kitchen till I brought her by the shoulders humming to the chair. I remember how the final days her eyelids, operating on their own, rose and fell, how she strolled among the children, winding tractors, hugging dolls, how finally I phoned and had them come again, how I walked behind them as they took her by the shoulders, house dress in the breeze, slowly down the walk and to the curbing, watched them bend her in the back seat of the squad again, how I watched them pull away and heard again the parliament of neighbors talking. Donal Mahoney