The Last Day

The Last Day

S. Rouzbeh

The last day

is twenty-four hours;

a border between being

and not being.

Between a young person

who was still breathing

and a photograph

that tomorrow

would rest against a mother’s breast;

a photograph with cold corners

and glass

that, however often it is wiped,

still

holds the fingerprints.

Young people

who did not know

the hands of the clock

had reached their final turn;

in their eyes

there was still life,

tomorrow was possible,

and hope

a window facing morning.

Still

the scent of fresh bread

drifted through the alleys,

still

the warmth of a cup of tea

lingered in their hands,

still

the shoes beside the door

stood in pairs

for an ordinary departure.

But death,

in the darkness,

had wound its clock

without a sound;

like a clock

that stops at midnight

on a table

and no one

hears it stop.

Mothers

who did not know

that some embraces

are the last;

the last warmth of a shoulder,

the last scent of a shirt,

the last hand

brushing the hair

back from a forehead.

And some farewells

linger for years in the ears of a house;

inside the kettle’s song,

among the rustle of curtains,

behind a door

whose every opening

makes someone’s heart

for an instant

beat in mistaken hope.

Fathers

whose home’s supporting pillar collapsed,

who stood upright

so no one

would see them break;

with hands

that still

turned the key in the lock,

but no longer

had the strength to open

any door.

Sisters and brothers

whose home had lost a voice;

a voice that once

came from behind a wall,

with a brief laugh,

with the slam of a door,

with something falling to the floor;

and no word

could fill its absence.

Children

watched a door

that did not open;

for hours

they mistook the sound of the lift

for familiar footsteps,

held their breath

at every ring of the telephone,

and waited for a hand

that would never again

rest upon their heads.

At night,

the hall light

stayed on until morning;

the shoes beside the door

gathered dust,

and a chair

that no one sat in

slowly

became part of the house’s silence.

Tears

passed from eyes into memory

and there

became springs;

in a brief recorded voice,

in a shirt

that still

held the scent of its wearer,

in a cup

that no one had the heart

to clear from the table.

The last day

is more than a story of death;

it is the story of a life

with roads untravelled,

laughter unheard,

meetings never reached,

and a tomorrow

that suddenly

had no tomorrow.

It is the story of a morning

when the curtains were drawn back

but no one

rose to see it;

the story of bread

left on the cloth,

a message

that went unread,

and clothes

hung up

for another day.

It is the story of those

who went out for freedom,

and the loved ones

who afterwards

lived with their absence;

with an empty place

that sat at the table,

with a name

that stayed among the phone’s contacts,

with a photograph

dusted

every year

that never

grew old.

Perhaps its bitterest meaning is this:

no one knows

which hour

will be the last;

which look

the final look;

and which departure

the beginning of an endless wait.

Perhaps that last look

was in the kitchen’s pale light,

beside a misted window,

amid the sound of a spoon

striking the rim of a cup;

perhaps that last departure

came with a door closing softly,

and no one

knew

that this sound

would echo for years

in their memory.

The last day

has not yet ended:

in a clock that has stopped,

in a door that does not open,

in a light that stays on until morning

for no reason,

in a name we call

from which no answer comes.

In the dust

settling on a picture frame,

in the empty place

that catches

the eye each time,

in the sound of footsteps

coming down the hall

that fade

before they arrive.

The last day

is not twenty-four hours;

it is the moment

one person is lost from the world,

and the world,

with all its weight,

the following morning

grows light again.

Bread is baked,

water boils in the kettle,

buses set off,

a child ties a shoelace,

and someone,

with a hand that still

trembles with grief,

draws back the curtain.

Not because they have forgotten;

to learn

that loss,

however deep,

cannot

close every window in the world.

And so life continues;

not without them,

but with them;

with their names in our throats,

with their gaze in our eyes,

with their absence,

which every day

takes a new shape of love.

And the heart,

beside that empty place,

not out of forgetfulness,

but in honour of the one who has gone,

goes on beating.