God's Flowers

One of my special interests in therapist education is preparation for work with victims of family violence. This week we've been talking about elder abuse--a particularly troublesome issue. Here is a poem that I came across and to which my students are required to write a response:

The Shoebox

by Vanillafire (2005)

On her lap is a shoebox
she holds every day,
while she watches out the window
the world she is no longer in.

Once a day she lifts the lid,
lets aged fingers
sift through memories,
pick up pieces of the past.

pictures of her husband, flower dried
from their first date, drawings done by
children, poem from a friend, old-
fashioned photo of her parents, piece
of silken wedding dress, gift pin from
retirement dinner, tiny confirmation
bible, seashells from both oceans

Nurses pass and check in often.
Sometimes they stay awhile,
to listen, to learn of her box,
of her.

Back at the nurses station
some wonder why she wants
to keep on living. “Sad how she
hangs on to that box.”

Others smile, the ones who stop,
to fix her hair and chat.
They know it is not simply a box
that she cherishes, a container
for her reason to live.

It is her life she relives daily,
the happiness she’s known.
her present is that shoebox,
and what a gift
she has to give.