Daddy - Mel Afoa

She looks at him, furious tears falling down.

She watches as he coughes violently on the hospital bed,

his face pale, hands cold and body stiff and sore.

She never leaves him alone in the room,

fearing he'll leave her alone in the earth.

She prays to the Lord before she sleeps,

asking him for an Angel above to save his soul.

She knows he is going soon, she senses it,

watches helplessly as he loses consciousness many times.

She tells him about her everyday life as he sleeps in a coma,

her hands shaking him furiously as he doesn't respond.

She cries into the hospital bedsheets when the doctors walk out,

she notices their face sombre, and how depression enters the room.

She prays harder, looking at the empty walls for help, for hope.

She cries, " Daddy, i'll do anything", over and over again,

scared to close her eyes in case his soul leaves the door.

" Daddy, please. God, help. Please, someone save my daddy",

is what the doctors here everyday in Room 34,

the room of a dying man with his sombre wife and 10yr old daughter.

She turns to her mother for help, and cries when she sees her mum crying,

screaming at her when her mother offers words of comfort.

She sleeps when she sees her mother guarding him as he slowly dies,

holding onto her teddy she named after her dad.

She is sleeping when he finally passes away,

and misses her dad being whisked away from the room.

She wakes up, and finds an empty bed,

her mother looking out the window with the tears falling softly.