My Mind

 
A crowded emergency room experience in a Nova Scotian hospital pre-2020
 
This nurse took my spectacles:
Put in an I.V.
 
That nurse took my blouse and jeans.
Put me in a Johnny shirt.
 
Said this will give me more time.
I asked a question...
 
Another nurse took my blood.
The answer is not in my blood.
 
See?
My mind is Ok. 
 
People pass as shadows and murmurs.
I want to see their beauty,
But must be hidden in ugly words
 
See?
My mind is ok
 
I hear: “She should be dead.”
I hear: “And have the right to choose.”
I hear: “Waste of food, wasted food.”
 
You see
Baby, my mind. 
 
My mind holds the memories:
I toss a balloon to my grandchild,
We are young and able.
 
My mind is…
Ok.
 
I hear a nurse: “her eyes are sunk so deep.”
My eyes? Where are all the mirrors?
I hear my daughter: “She needs her own room.”
 
Don't worry.
My mind is waiting
In a room of ugly words.
 
 
Tears fall from my mind.
I see…
I see…
 
I remember the day I couldn't get out of bed on my own.
I stopped worrying about being pretty enough.
I hear my daughter, a baby in her arms: “my mom needs her own room.”
 
I hear: my daughter weep.
I hear: the arrival of food.
I hear: “waste.”
 
And my daughter weep.
See, my daughter,
Is not ok with this.
 
“Bring me apple juice, I like apple juice.”
I want,
I still want…
 
My mind
Is.
 
Rest assured,
She doesn’t know
Wait, what is happening.
 
Oh, she was with us
There for a moment.
How was she yesterday?
 
I hear my daughter: She needs her own room.
I say: “Don't worry.”
I do though.
 
Because my mind
Is Ok.
 
I wait; in the promise of more time.
In a crowd. My heart beating
Blood through my ears.
 
Can I have my own room
You know?
My mind is ok.