Disfigured Family

It could all end so quickly;
it could all go amiss
in the blink of an eye

A slight error in judgement
in speed and direction,
and a body permanently injured
on a day that should have been
full of celebration

A career, cut far too short
and a woman,
and her family,
changed in an array of ways
forever

The wrinkles in his face,
the disfiguring of his fingers,
the strange curve of his spine-
none of these things added to his age
the way tumors do

These things, I cannot
even see, I know are there
beneath the surface of his
weathered, browned skin;
he has aged years in months
and months in days
and every day I pray to
reverse this wretched
aging process

And I wonder how everything
could have fallen apart
so rapidly-
and I desperately wish
I had control
over something