Booth, Philip : Fallback

Literature Annotations

Genre	Poem
Keywords	Aging, Body Self-Image, Caregivers, Dementia, Institutionalization, Love, Memory, Patient Experience, Survival, Time
Summary	This is a lovely poem about an elderly married couple who share a room at a nursing home. The woman is confined to bed because her backbone is "so thin / the doctor jokes that X-rays can't find it." Her husband's mind is gone. The woman reflects on the morning activities, especially those of the "night girl" who brings the breakfast trays and, later, bends down to take her husband's tray, "the perfume / still lingering from whatever went on / before last night's shift." The woman asks herself: How would this young girl of 20 know that the two elderly people she is caring for once "made love / in the sweetfern high on an island."
Commentary	A poignant poem that expresses the deep and serene love of an elderly woman for her now-demented husband. It is especially moving in the context of their current lives--in a nursing home, where their daughter rarely has time to visit and the "night girls" turn them into curious objects of impatience or pity.
Source	Selves
Publisher	Viking
Edition	1990
Place Published	New York
Alternate Source	Literature & Aging
Alternate Publisher	Kent State Univ. Press
Alternate Edition	1992
Alternate Editors	Martin Kohn, Carol Donley,and Delese Wear
Place Published	Kent, Ohio
Annotated by	Coulehan, Jack
Date of Entry	06/26/95
Last Revised	01/28/97