Goodbye Dad

When I travelled back to the UK for my mother's funeral a few years ago, I visited my father who was in a nursing home with chronic Alzheimers disease, he passed away around a year later Goodbye Dad As I walk down the corridor of the nursing home I see a gaggle of old dears who are on the roam A Malay nurse smiles, I see that by fate’s design I am living in her country and she’s living in mine Then I’m stood at the door to the room of my dad Inside the solitary figure is looking lonely and sad He sits with an unopened newspaper on his knee I tell him ‘Hello dad’ but he doesn’t recognise me I look at this old man who is both gentle and kind I ‘m wondering what is happening inside his mind A mind that was as sharp as a razor if you please Until it was destroyed by the Alzheimer’s disease A disease that leaves the victim in vacuous state All memory washed away as crumbs from a plate To gurgle down the plug hole to a sewer of waste The years of their lives disappear without a trace It is a harrowing sight to see dad in such a place With a baffled expression upon his dear old face His fragile hands on a table by a half-eaten meal Hands that used to make the best Sheffield steel I see a photo of my mum, which to my dad I pass And he says ‘my word, she is a good looking lass’ I explain she was his wife, but this he cannot grip And that for sixty years they shared a partnership Whatever the subject he could remember naught No geography, no history, no world wars, no sport When it was time to go, I kissed his old forehead The tears were welling up, ‘Goodbye Dad’ I said Out in my northern city street I took a deep breath Glad to get away from sad old folk awaiting death I drove off thinking of my life when I was just a kid I knew I would not see dad again, and I never did