{"id":1637,"date":"2018-11-02T11:01:17","date_gmt":"2018-11-02T17:01:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.irenenorth.com\/writings\/?p=1637"},"modified":"2024-04-22T02:46:13","modified_gmt":"2024-04-22T02:46:13","slug":"sweet-adalaide","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/irenenorth.com\/writings\/2018\/11\/02\/sweet-adalaide\/","title":{"rendered":"Sweet Adalaide"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

My mother worked for twenty-seven years at the Middletown Psychiatric Center<\/a>. Most of her career was on the geriatric units. Over the years, I got to know a few of the patients. I always liked talking with Adalaide, even if she didn’t talk much. Just as I entered my teenage years, she passed away. I wrote this poem about her a decade later, sometime between 1993 and 1995.<\/p>\n

Sweet Adalaide<\/strong><\/p>\n

I stride in to the room
\nsmelling the stench of institution life
\nher beauty caught my eye
\nI began to talk to her and realized
\nshe was a looker even at eighty-five<\/p>\n

Adalaide can’t remember my name
\nshe doesn’t remember much these days
\nbut her grin fills in the empty spaces in her mind
\nshe doesn’t really need words, expressions say it all
\nwithout a memory she can’t recall the things of days gone by
\nbut Adalaide’s laughter always fills the void<\/p>\n

and Adalaide sits in her chair
\nresting, thinking about days gone by
\nthat she can’t remember
\ncrossing her legs, she smiles at me and thanks me for coming
\nwaving goodbye I smile and notice
\nthe tears in her eyes<\/p>\n

I spoke with Adalaide today
\nshe said she doesn’t mind being here
\nbut I know better
\nshe wants to be outside with the birds and the trees
\nliving a life she no longer remembers
\nno, she can’t remember<\/p>\n

so I sit and listen to her
\nabout days that have passed us by
\nin her big, white chair
\nwith tears in my eyes<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

My mother worked for twenty-seven years at the Middletown Psychiatric Center. Most of her career was on the geriatric units. Over the years, I got to know a few of the patients. I always liked talking with Adalaide, even if she didn’t talk much. Just as I entered my teenage years, she passed away. I […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[24,257,284,285],"class_list":["post-1637","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-poetry","tag-alzheimers","tag-new-york","tag-poem","tag-poetry"],"post_mailing_queue_ids":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/irenenorth.com\/writings\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1637","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/irenenorth.com\/writings\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/irenenorth.com\/writings\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/irenenorth.com\/writings\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/irenenorth.com\/writings\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1637"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/irenenorth.com\/writings\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1637\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3802,"href":"https:\/\/irenenorth.com\/writings\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1637\/revisions\/3802"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/irenenorth.com\/writings\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1637"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/irenenorth.com\/writings\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1637"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/irenenorth.com\/writings\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1637"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}