I found her on the kitchen floor.

She’d had a seizure.

I was terrified.

She’d had seizures before.
Sometimes she’d just stare into space
Hoping that nothingness
was something more.

Sometimes she’d have drop attacks
fall to the floor
as if gravity itself
would swallow her whole

The roles were reversed
The elder had become
the child
and the child
the caretaker.

Why did it have to be now?
When the whole world
was falling apart around us?

I rushed to her side
Shook her awake

“Auntie Anna,” I breathed.
“You scared the shit out of me.”

She blinked.
“I’m okay,” she breathed.
“I’m okay.”

I’m okay.

“What happened, Auntie?”

She had seen it all
the sorrow
the world and its people
trying to destroy
what was once so beautiful

What we had worked so hard
to build.

She had seen the lights
coming down
from the sky
it was all too much
and her brain
short circuited.

I told her I would stay…

We watched the world
crumble into dust.
Our old realities faded
and a new reality began.
I told her I would stay…

Because she would have done
the same
for me.