An Old Man Running While Carrying a Volume of The World Book Encyclopedia

A Scene from a Hospital Waiting Room

Cups of coffee are reverently borne
Along the bright hospital corridors
By nurses, doctors, technicians, and all
Scrub-suited healers on their dutiful rounds

But wait! A lean, energetic old man
His wild white hair brimming his gimme cap
Dodges among the sacred cups, and runs
Up the stairs to the ICU waiting room

Clutching an old encyclopedia
Like a dispatch from the front –
                                                               I wish I’d asked