Terminal Lucidity

by Todd Matson

Seeing her son as father,

her daughter as mother,

she launched into a long

convoluted lecture, censors

short-circuiting at age 97,

the repressed returning,

feelings swallowed, words

choked back since age 7

making a grand entrance

from a hospice bed:

Stop fighting about money,

about whom gets what. For

the love of God, what do you

care more about: your house

or your child, your car or your

child, your furniture or your

child, your pots, pans and

silverware or your child,

your nest egg or your child?

Just as dementia has a way

of cutting through red tape,

truth has a way of slipping

through cracks of delusion,

certain questions have a way

of landing on the doorsteps

of anyone with ears to hear:

For the love of God, who

are we: vultures driven by

hunger or sons and daughters,

brothers and sisters driven

by love for one another?

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Todd Matson is a licensed marriage and family therapist in North Carolina, United States. His poetry has been published in The Journal of Pastoral Care and Counseling, Salvation South, Soul-Lit, The Clayjar Review, Agape Review, Redrosethorns, San Antonio Review, The Brussels Review, The Shallot and Mobius: The Journal of Social Change; and his short stories have been published in Ariel Chart International Literary Journal; Faith, Hope and Fiction; Agape Review and The Piker Press. He has also written lyrics for songs recorded by several contemporary Christian music artists, including Brent Lamb, Connie Scott and The Gaither Vocal Band.