On Alzheimer's and Dementia

By B. Howard Barnhill

“Everywhere at the End of Time” is

Like moths turning a Newspaper Stand to ribbons.

Trying to describe feeling rather than effect;

The consciousness drifts off like dandruff in—to reduce into moss.

Let the Universal Spirit hold you, I’ll dust off our shoulders.

Grandmother, gatekeeper to whole social networks of relatives long since past.

Her disconnected father, the Protestant Luther,

Trying to speak truth,

while avoiding another. Draped in unworldliness.

May I keep my head above the books

Long enough to escape from escape

And know my surroundings, love them.

We are no wiser,

Since the lapse of Grandma Joan’s memories.

Joan who rose

like smoke from a smoldering bologna

sandwich onto the day.

“You have to die somehow,” she’d say.

Until the breeze carries us away from body

Up the forested hilltop trail, to the graves where Emily Webb lay to rest,

among the whispering ghosts, waiting to dissolve into what lays beyond,

that intangible embrace which envelops us entirely.

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B. Howard Barnhill is a Cincinnati native, currently studying English-Creative Writing and History. In his free time he enjoys pouring over information to the point of obsession, rambling to his loved ones, and practicing escapism like it was his job.

Instagram: brady_barnhill

Featured art: Untitled (uncovered grave, Madisonville Prehistoric Cemetary, Madisonville, Ohio). Photographer unknown.