POETRY: Alzheimer’s III

I count the years again
on fingers she can cling to
and tell her, though
the answer is the same
it was an empty space
of time ago.

She asks about
the children
“Whose?” I ask
“I don’t know,” she says
So like an echo I repeat
her children’s names.

My name, my sisters’
my dad’s;
children, husband that
she’s forgotten and I cry
for too soon she’ll forget
to breathe.