poem

Poem #21

Sunday evening of a long weekend call;

No sleep, fuzzy brained unshaven.

Too many operations,

Too many treks down half-empty hospital halls,

Too many 3 a.m. ER telephone calls.

I barely keep anything straight.

Thoughts slip in and out

Like rabbits through an ornamental fence

Surrounding a ravaged garden.

I’ve lost at least a few poems

This way, glimpses of things possibly interesting

But lacking the energy to look twice.

Missed connections, sand sifted through hands,

Having all the ingredients

When you’re hungry

But not in the mood to cook.

An insight into a truth

But too beat down, burned out

To muster the effort to make it sprout.

The last patient was this wizened

Cancer-riddled old lady wasting away,

Fascia nearly effaced.

There wasn’t much there to close

So I made do with what was left.

It won’t hold forever.

It won’t last.

But sometimes we must 

Pick up the pieces

Of what we see,

Of what remains,

Gather up the fumbled

Verbs and nouns and weave

It back together the best we can

And that's the way it will be.

3/7/21