I’m in Health Care’s  belly,
I’m denuded, frocked, and bedded into the Cath lab, my Docs are there
.           to send a snake into my plumbing.
They find a block, balloon in a Stent, I get a patch on my groin
have a hospital lunch            I’d settle for anything
wait to move upstairs for overnight recovery.

No room in the inn, stay in the recovery room
all the other patients are gone
Cath lab will be closing soon
nurses are laughing, a good sign.  But
Death’s dread figure dances / outside.
Sneaked in with a Vasovagal event
Heart stopped, I fell, I think now, there was nothing
no St Peter, no Krisna, nothing
bells rang, nurses rushed,   I missed a piece of time..

Waiting       Being here is waiting     For release
I’ve a hunger headache, constipated, wired up,    Can’t move
Can’t shit,   but piss a-plenty

Always a struggle for life
against the bodies natural path to death,
else despair rushes up early     so many poets died that way.
Observe the road marks, our Burma shave signs,
Vasovagal events,  gasping for breath,     steps too much to climb.

It’s too early, perhaps, for me to die
but this way is attractive
the cost but a moment of nausea
then sinking away quietly.

Do we hold on until it’s really bad
until there are untold interventions.

Juggle  questions of eternity,
know  about infinity,   about decay and dust,
the eternity of particles lost in black holes,
and the black hole the godless spirit
goes to with the last / quieting breath,

but not today,    love claims me back
free of gasping, dire implants, or shattered breast.

Kent Bowker      12/8/12