The logical place, across the broad expanse
of shoulder blades holding it in parens
the heart being too exposed for this story
of how we met in chairs lined up in a row.
I saw you before you noticed me.
Those years unrolled in between
not a burden, a star-banner shawl
bordered in selvages and hope.
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Spectres and spectacles of wild wants
ironclad links
and oral history of oral histories
counterintuitive improprieties
in the halo of time
art machines of a clandestine flow
very intact
heart full of napalm
at the dawn of a sizzling moan.
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the intubation
the IV
the central line
the catheter
the protracted
protocols
all placed
in fiendish
anticipation
call her sons
they warned
her family
her friends
get them here,
sooner
than later
I’m told I
un-intubated myself
quelled their precious
protocol
so they put
a morphine pump
in my left palm
I remember you
stayed awake
all night
to wake me
when it was time
to squeeze
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In the psych ward we sit around the television
Little seeing or hearing the shows,
We think about the fistful of pills
About the man who jumped under a train
Wondering if it was worth it.
If we’re worth it.
Another enters the room
He’s been to see the doctor,
We know the doctor hadn’t said anything,
We know the nurse had spent the entire time thinking
She’d forgotten the can of milk on the kitchen table.
The middle aged man just arrived goes to the corner
From the table he finds a plastic cup and a water can.
It’s empty — it’s always empty.
“How was it?” an old lady asks him.
The man laughs, “Over and done with.
I’m going home tomorrow.”
We nod, some smiling faintly, others frowning deeply.
There’s no place as full of hope as the psych ward.
And no place as noteworthy by its importance
In being the place for lost souls just before they dissipate
To become once again part of the public society.