Keep watch. Night saps you, catches you with a blackjack,
drains you like sand sifted through an hourglass
running low on patience, low on time, low on hope,
but it's 11:00 p.m. and you've been here three days
and so has everyone else so you keep quiet and

Keep watch. Under the fluorescent hospital lights,
your stage awaits so you put on a brave face,
paint that clown mask and start the production:
not tears, not fears, just enough to get them through
to the miracle waiting for them, but you've been around
and you know miracles ain't cheap, so keep the faith and

Keep watch. Through the racking coughs, through the
distant sobbing all receding into absence of thought
to match absence of action, as your turn comes up
to give this mockery of last rites, to sanctify the dead
and soon to be dead, to keep some kind of memory and

Keep watch.