There is a whirr of a dozen beige boxes
A rhythmic thunk of wheels on slight gaps in linoleum flooring
A morose two-note alarm as your oxygen dips,
(Or is it that the sensor
has declared liberty from your finger? No,
it is tightly affixed)
At a time when that means death.
Means the reasons why we all
Shy our faces from one another, living
Top-halfedly, when beds are too scarce
When I am just barely allowed inside
Walking vector as I am
Yet — there are two of the coveted things there
Tucked into shadows thrown from monitors and screens
Your sheets filled by you in one, the other
Recast in miniature for a much newer soul
You lie and she lies, in tandem
In solemn silent solidarity
Your breaths in time (her
Fitting six into each of yours
Honeycombed and small)
They do not know why yours lack depth
I am shock-awake on the backbreaking couch
when they burst in or
— is it the floor? From the mattress I filled with air from
my own lungs
On that first night we nestled in the wing —
Five milkwhite-coat shrouded ghosts of comfort
From far-flung corners of the complex
They say, "Take your daughter away,
She cannot be here while we run the machine."
And your eyes do not open
In the hallway I bow my head and stare at her
Because she is perfect and because
I cannot bear to see the thing they pull over you
A nuclear blanket that twists your cells
And tells them nothing
I wash my face in saline
Nonetheless we are sent home after two days. The patient has improved
Because the numbers are somehow greater
Seven later you return. You cannot
Draw breath draw life draw anything
From the ocean of our room
Your voice on the phone shakes tindistant. "They think
I might have blood clots in my lungs," and I am crushed
Into a paste, which I scrape and collect
And reshape into a replicant which has hands enough to feed our daughter
And she and I together in the soft lamplight
Her tamarind pod eyes glimmering
In our bed, just two
And you, on some distant shore —
Some faraway land reaching across a saltwet sea —
(which fills your chest and presses your lungs) —
The ocean is pinched closed.