the place smells like medicine
\nlike strong solvents viricides
\nthe floors gleam impossibly
\nnurses walk on rubber soled runners
\nclad in efficient pastel unisuits
\nthere is a swath of silence around us
\nin this room that focuses on
\nthe single remarkable event
\nthat is so natural it is unspeakable<\/p>\n
each breath is a new effort
\nexperimental, occasional
\nas if only conscious effort
\nmakes each cycle possible
\neach hesitant rise of the
\ncarefully smoothed pastel sheets
\nproceeds like the result
\nof an equation not quite
\ncalculated but improvised
\nfor the present emergency<\/p>\n
we watch each cycle
\nsee the faint imagined
\npulse of a temple vein
\nas a hopeless hope
\na monitor draws out the
\ndiminishing pulse silently
\nunlike in the movies yet
\nI could grope for a gulp
\nof buttered popcorn<\/p>\n
the efficient nurse seems
\nmore concerned about us
\nsitting, standing around the
\nhigh metal bed
\nwould you like some coffee
\nor juice they have sandwiches
\nall night in the cafeteria<\/p>\n
each of us different
\nlord let it end
\ndo everything to keep life going
\nthis is too sad to contemplate
\ndo not resussitate
\nthis was a noble life let us remember that
\nwhat do we do
\nI feel focused upon
\nyet this is unscripted
\nbut the director watches intently
\nI feel his eyes making an actor of me
\nI remember giggling at the
\noh so solemn funeral of
\na classmate as the tiny coffin
\nwas carried to the front
\nof the church by weeping relatives<\/p>\n
I don’t think I will giggle now<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
the place smells like medicine like strong solvents viricides the floors gleam impossibly nurses walk on rubber soled runners<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2,3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-143","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-creative-writing","category-poetry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/riverwriter.ca\/wordcurrents\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/143","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/riverwriter.ca\/wordcurrents\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/riverwriter.ca\/wordcurrents\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/riverwriter.ca\/wordcurrents\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/riverwriter.ca\/wordcurrents\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=143"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/riverwriter.ca\/wordcurrents\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/143\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/riverwriter.ca\/wordcurrents\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=143"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/riverwriter.ca\/wordcurrents\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=143"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/riverwriter.ca\/wordcurrents\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=143"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}