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Ellen Foos: Letting Assisted Living Have a Say
Communication
It’s like a bad internet connection,
the brain not processing at normal speed.
My impatience is the same,
trying to get a response that takes forever.
Time to switch providers
or go off the grid.
There is no way to reboot and start over,
a metaphor lost before I can claim it.
A slow, offhand decline leading
to a deathbed scene.
We are both losing something.
I am losing him,
he is losing himself.
~~~
Caught in the Rain
We sat in the gazebo
surrounded by showers
blowing in from all directions,
our center of dryness getting smaller
and smaller until we huddled close,
finishing our soggy meal.
As caregiver, I have not had his protection
in months, yet now I felt sheltered,
we were in it together.
He was spilling food in his lap
and talking wishfully
but enjoying the rain like every
possibility could happen.
~~~
The Worm That Is my Anxiety
Is just a worm,
it loves the soil like I do.
When it leaves the soil it dies.
It’s ugly and strange
but harmless because it is an earthworm,
not a parasite in my system.
It’s actually useful in the ecosystem,
so I accept that my anxiety helps me
be awake to possibilities.
Though it may threaten and grow large,
then I tell it, make room for hope,
in the expansion of my deep breaths.
~~~
Letting Assisted Living Have a Say
Those sturdy self-righteous souls
adhere to honor and obey
by keeping their ailing loved one at home,
while I open the door to another possibility.
Each beige- and sage-colored facility
is almost the same—seasonal decorations,
old folks in front of the big-screen TV.
Cheerful tour guides hand out slick folders
full of useful information that highlights
bus trips to festivals and shopping malls.
One resident has reached the ripe age
of one hundred and eight,
while another rides up on a scooter and
hands out candy from a woven basket.
None of this scares me now that I am
about ready to hand over my husband,
and his life’s savings, just so I can save myself
~~~
Copyright 2026 Ellen Foos
Ellen Foos worked for many years as an editor for Princeton University Press. Currently, she is Editor in Chief of Ragged Sky Press.
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One of the most important of our life-conundrums.
These four little poems tell the story beautifully, Ellen,
and from necessary and important perspectives.
“None of this scares me now that I am
about ready to hand over my husband,
and his life’s savings, just so I can save myself”
It all comes down to that, doesn’t it. A terrible
and unnecessary place to be, because of our
“for profit” health system and the limits placed
on our medicare insurance—the most of it going to
private corporations instead of aging citizens’ needs.
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Honesty, compassion, love… thank you for posting these poems. “… to hand over my husband so I can save myself” heartbreaking decisions so many of us will soon have to make.
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yes…. we will.
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I was there with Fred again 16 years ago. Now I sit in the ADU I had built behind my son’s house. I travel between here and big house full of things that must be dispersed. My dog and I are in the inbetween.
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You sound like messenger-angels carrying things between here and thereafter.
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Beautifully done. Painfully true.
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Thanks, Al. I agree! Michael Simms
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Thank you Ellen and Michael! These poems both face and tame the dragon. We all need them by our side.
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Yes, Eva and I are getting older, and we’ve begun discussing these issues. I admire the clarity and compassion of Ellen’s poems here.
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I admire them too…
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