I wrote this poem in my mother's hospital room.

You sleep
With eyes open.
 
You listen
With eyes
Deciphering
The movement of lips.
Braille hearing.
You scream in whispers.
 
My son is a stethoscope
Of listening.
 
Plastic vein for pulse.
Tremor of tiny fingers
That used to sew quilts.
 
This is not how
We thought it would be.
 
We stand around your bed
As though it were an altar.
Brother lays at your feet
Seeking absolution.
 
The room is vinegar and hyssop.
 
There are no prayers
In this mausoleum.
 
Perfunctory keepers
Of serums and charts
Tick us off
Clockwise,
Counting
One more thing to do.
 
Is this a job?
 
The tying down
Of need-to formulas.
Sucking blood
From arteries.
Puncturing tendons and nerves
As though you were a quilt.
 
This room is a foreign language
I do not want to learn,
But must understand.
 
Holding my breath,
I watch you swim
Looking for an exit
Other than the sealed
Window and open door.
 
The room is a neon halo box
Of oxygen-less air.
 
Effort is an anti-
Biotic in a bag
Crying into
Your sinews.
A transfusion of dream
And time will tell.
 
Do we want to hear
What it has to say?
 
 By Romaine Washington, May 2016