Elisabeth Wentworth: On Courage

On Courage

i.m. Geoffrey Wentworth

Courage is the slow burn virtue

Necessity propels it

Wake up, remember, endure, repeat

Unlike the short sharp bang of bravery

What compels you to it may ask years of you

I know now your dignity was in denial

Of all of us you knew the score

Resolved to see it out in silence

Ignore the rising tally of the falls

The telltale gait

Pretend that you were still deciding

Whether or not to walk through that door

Laugh it off, as soldiers will, to overwrite the fear

I wish now we had taken all our cues from you

You hated the noise of our concern

Our hovering, our solicitude

We did better when we let you be

But to us, back then, there seemed so little time

I see now you looked far ahead

As you sat in your stiff and stubborn pride

At those awkward gatherings

Of the newly-diagnosed

While others blindly sought advice

On how to eat, talk, walk

You took the experts aside

And asked

And how will I die?

                Elisabeth Wentworth