I hesitate to judge life
from a hospital gurney.
The bleak barrenness
of unobstructed walls,
the white acoustic tile of ceilings
softening the sound of traffic,
shuffling feet,
clumps of people.
I noted people arrive in groups,
press together,
children holding legs.
The asides of people in despair,
about children,
mom and dad,
the accident,
calamity.
Most of the world’s pain and suffering
isn’t here, I thought ruefully.
As we arrived in the operating room
for the procedure,
a euphemism for the replacement
of a heart,
mending a limb,
restoring vital function,
my thoughts fled outside,
down the street,
where you could breathe
the freedom of the air
and not cope with an exercise
of existential proportions.
I may die.
The closing of dreams,
accomplishments,
nurture of whatever I love,
with consequences
too painful to contemplate.
But, with any luck,
I may be spared
and walk out tomorrow
or the next day,
and be unchanged,
or changed in another way.
My story is,
I survived
and now I am a man,
down that street,
thumbing a ride
with someone or something
to explain the order
of the universe.
Why the fragile beauties of existence
are destined to end like this,
with rides on a gurney
to the operating room,
and you wonder if you’re a sparrow,
destined to fall from the sky,
with no hands to catch you.