Yourself again

I can still count your ribs under my fingers, prominent beneath the thin patient gown.  It's all you wear now, besides the bold headwrap and clean white bandages.  You weren't yourself yet when you woke up after surgery, eyes confused and sad, and a wrinkled insistent finger pointing to the well-taped NG tube.  This does not belong here...remove it.

You tell us you are on a ship, but do you know which ship that is?  Do you remember that this is the hospital that promised to remove your tumor?  Do you recognize that you are Halima when you look in the mirror and see a face that is so much smaller now?  I watch you struggle to swallow around a mass that is no longer there, and sometimes I see you reaching up past the bandages to touch the thin air in wonder.  Does it surprise you every time?

Who were you before this lump appeared on your face...do you remember what life was like when you were only yourself?

I brought my own warm blood while you slept in the operating room and I prayed it would make you strong.  After you woke up after surgery I tried the little Pular I knew but you struggled to reply.  You sat still on your bed and did not stroke the soft hairs on my arm or hug me tight.  Did you remember you were looking for us?

This morning I came in to work and you hugged me and hugged me again as you passed by, thin fingers stroking my arm hairs and a sparkle in your tired eyes.  The chaplains came with their guitar and drums and the joyful steady beat of African praise, and you shuffled into the center of the circle with your arms raised and then clasped tight around me as we danced together in rhythm with the djembes.

Your face and your throat have begun to heal, but it will take time to fill in where the tumor has been.

Will it take that long to fill your heart?  I think not.  Already you are becoming yourself again.