Terrified.
Pulled out of mind,
pain racked body
screams from far away
and I have
no recourse –
just curl into
a frozen ball on a
hospital floor, as if
I could escape
this misery.
Terrified.
“Just Relax.”
Breathe,
I am told
in a room
without windows…
Hooked up
to tubes
for their convenience
not mine, certainly.
My entire arm
turns black
as I endure further assault.
Above, White light
Burns my eyes,
I throw up
again to platitudes
uttered in total ignorance-
perhaps stupidity.
When I complain
without remorse
I am the “Bitch” –
An old one at that.
This inhumane treatment
is our broken
medical system –
the Perfect Machine,
oblivious to human frailty.
I am terrified.
Once home
with dear canine
Companions
And a dove
who sings up
the moon,
I can once again
contemplate
Gratitude
that I survived
One more trauma,
if only from afar.
Terrified.
What if this had been
my time of dying?
To spend final moments
in fright
not of death,
But of what human robots
might do next?
Terrified.
This morning
I staggered to the river
to gaze at the sky
before dawn.
A sky full of bruised purple
and pink, an orange glow
etching bare branches in black ink.
The Earth moves through her cycles
And this brings me comfort.
Silencing the fright
crackling through hopelessly fragile bones.
