I met a man today with Parkinson’s disease,
his hands permanently clenched shut.
The power, once contagious at birth
no longer accepts the next morsel.

His wife, seemed spat from reshuffled pain,
and leading him into a known future.

I watched them closely.
They once dreamed of sweet genesis,
a life grown of man’s new strength.

They danced on the same floor,
touched in slow succession
on damp common ground.

Now, she takes him to the toilet and
wipes him clean again and again.

“Is it dirty
does it look dirty”
She asked

I held his hand.
And sitting softly, in my soul
I told him that his
life has not yet been cancelled.

 

Note

Statistics show that almost half of the ten million people affected by Parkinson’s Disease, or PD, worldwide are in China. The disease has become the third most deadly disease for elderly people in China. About 1.7% of the country’s population above 65 suffers from PD and nearly 100 thousand new cases emerge each year. The World Health Organization estimates China will see six million PD patients by 2030.