at night

At night I hold her close. I warm her cold feet and hands.

For a while I pretend we are newly married and are full of the love and passion of youth.

I love you, I tell her, she snuggles close.

For a while, lying there before we go to sleep, I pretend that all is well and all is what it always was and what I always wanted it to be.

“I love you Bertha, I say,” using her middle name.

“Good,” she says. Yesterday she added: ”Stay with me, stay with me until I die.”

I promise I will, and I will if I have any say in the matter.