all the options compete
for a sliver of my attention
which is split thinner and thinner
but if i’m captured and amused
it’s cool, it’s a good deal
i come out ahead
it’s contended incessantly
that my attention is utterly monetized
subliminally
but i don’t care
i say it’s a bargain
it’s like selling your soul
when you know you don’t have one

the hospital is a maze
built in confusing sections
but that’s just the start
the people i deal with
are a maze within a maze
patients, families, nurses, doctors
other respiratory therapists
and superimposed on all this
is another maze
the conundrums i try to solve
a fella fell off a cliff
a jehova’s witness fell off a roof
a 16 year old shot himself in the head
my strategies for keeping them breathing
or not
every one a maze
and i’ll never find my way out

the nurse called in security
because the patient was all worked up
about getting discharged

patient:  "if i go home and have another seizure
i’m coming back here and slap everyone"

security:  "you can’t make violent threats, sir"

patient:  "i ain’t making violent threats
i’m just gonna slap’em"

just had a patient kiss my hands
for helping her out in the ER
never happened when i gave guitar lessons
though it should have

level one trauma
woman attacked by two pitbulls
they brought her thumb in a bag

it’s a shocker
that earth is still spinning
on its axis

if you listen to music you actually enjoy
you win
it’s hard to nail the moment of pleasure
for things that are pleasurable
but a song is a bullseye

people are chromosomes
so we shouldn’t be surprised
when we act like chromosomes
bivalent bonding
after a couple of drinks
it’s chemistry

he tripped over a pencil
and broke his ankle almost completely in two
he had a single tattoo on his scary belly
a big-busted beauty
"do you smoke and drink?"
"YES!"
"how much do you smoke?"
"PACK A DAY!"
"how much do you drink?"
'TEN DRINKS A DAY!"
"beer?"
"NO!"
he tripped over a pencil
it snuck up on him

my identity is so slippery
my empathy so complete
(empathy, NOT sympathy)
that i’m not sure who’s me
when strolling a crowded street

i think guns are a pandemic in america
but if every ******* has a gun except me
i figured, at minimum, i’d better learn
how to load one without killing myself
the instructor eyeballed my sandals
and said nope
then handed me crocs and a glock
he taught me what i needed to know
and after firing a hundred rounds
i can say that if you ***** with me
your right knee is going down

how do you tell time?
clock
calendar
school
TV shows
first times--
kiss
laid
driving
drinking
first love
last love
all the pointless jobs
timeline of the children
lifespan of the cats
initial failures of the body
fatal subtraction of loved ones
the creeping ugliness of the mirror

he was going 110 on his harley
smack into a guardrail
where he left his nose, upper lip and moustache
which they peeled off and took with him
here to the hospital, putting him next to a fella
whose girlfriend tried to shoot him, missed
then stabbed him and tried to bite off his thumb
and they're next to a guy who found out
that shooting yourself in the head
does not make for a pleasant morning

the showbiz failed in room 63
"you look like you don't like your job"
said mrs. patient
i laughed
"i love my job"
"you don't look like you love your job"
"this job is great"
"i don't believe you
if your job involves other people
you should get another job"
i laughed again
"i will consider it!"

when politics is pure circus
the clown becomes ringmaster
merrily grabbing voters by the *****
it's the dancing elephant in the room

last day before vacation
so you know you gotta pay
an hour left on my shift
the patient was going full linda blair
arched pelvis grinding out of the bed
trying to pummel one and all
but when i came in the room
i triggered something special
YOU ****
i thought her head was gonna spin completely around
she punched me
people straining to hold her back
as she desperately snapped, trying to get a bite of me
GET OUT
GET THE **** OUT OF THE ROOM
as i got the **** out of the room
i explained to the nurses and doctors
i often have this effect on women

vacation
out of sight, out of my mind
when i return after a week off
and i enter the hospital where i work
i say oh yeah, this

i was chaining up my bike
when the woman approached

"excuse me, i don’t need food or money
do you have good eyes?"

"depends
what are we trying to see?"

"i dropped a bag of money down here
do you see it anywhere?"

"THAT i would see
and i don’t see it"

"oh dear
well i do need food and money"

"and when you find that bag
you’ll be all set
have a nice day"

eventually
all boats spring a leak
and every ship goes down
the ultimate port for each vessel
is the bottom of the sea

my friend dan, a rare and refined writer
came to pittsburgh for a poetry forum

in hopes of making a splash
he decided to bake a chicken
and bring it to the event
unfortunately he chose a kitchen
in ohio

i never got a piece

zombie apocalypse
what better way to process
all these brain dead monsters
murdering total strangers
and third graders
with their advanced weaponry
you can’t go to the supermarket
without fearing you’ll be assassinated
by the walking dead

all these people are trapped on the A train
they look half dead
maybe from the jobs they came from
or the subway
or the lives they’re heading home to
trapped head to toenail
but like all animals in captivity
open the cage door
pull them out
and they’ll hop right back in the cage
and call themselves happy

you think anyone was looking
out the window of the World Trade Center
9/11, 9:03 am?
she’d see a mammoth jet
zooming directly at her
becoming colossal in a split second
and she wouldn’t believe it
until she did

judgmental and uninformed
as enticing as bad teeth
but i would be too polite to point this out

we live in a world we do not understand
we navigate the surface
the superficial layer
without a clue as to what lies beneath
doesn’t slow us down much

just got a $1.11/hr raise
the rich get richer!

what’s happening in the Ukraine seems clear to us
but not to much of the world
World War I started because of a global chess game
hard to fathom from today’s perspective
if there are any survivors in the future
they’ll be scratching their heads
about why China/Russia and America
decimated the planet with World War III

biking to work at 5 a.m. on sunday morning
i see some malevolent ***** on saturday night
has dragged the sign YIELD TO PEDESTRIANS
from the sidewalk to the middle of the road
what was going through this idiot's mind?
"this is gonna be epic
have another beer and let's wait for the crash"
i drag the heavy base and flattened sign
back to the sidewalk
someone did indeed smash into it
but it's still dangerous
if that ******* had half a brain
he'd have seen that the only way to avoid the sign
would be to swerve head-on into the opposite lane
but maybe i'm mistaken about his motivation
maybe that was the point
maybe a car hadn't yielded to this pedestrian
and this is his revenge
"**** the world
starting with the ******* in this car
and all cars"

what happened?
what will happen?
where are we really?
and the why is a lost cause
why does that man have only one arm?
we will never know
we’re sunk in a swamp of boundless mystery
but we’re rolling fine without any answers
it effects the price of beer
but we’re gonna pay it anyway

he held a bullet next to his chest with his left hand
with his right he smashed it with a hammer
which is why he’s missing *******
he still has a chest and beating heart though
and glistening red toenails
this fellow does things his way

regarding Plato’s Ring of Invisibility

what could be ventured with invisibility?
Plato ponders filthy ***…  unbridled thievery…
well i tell you
when i think about invisibility
i say i’m already there
as are we all
i’ve got my body
which hardly instigates much commotion
but my thoughts are unseen
ulterior, inscrutable, out of sight
buried in a concrete bunker
i’m a secret agent on a secret mission
which keeps me busy far beyond thievery

this morning in the ER i met a large fella
who jumped out a second story window
escaping his girlfriend and her knife
he landed on his feet
unfortunately for his feet
dude should have cleaned the cat box

gotta give it to the New York Times
every week they blindside you
with a new apocalyptic scenario
that you had no idea existed
when armageddon arrives
the only mystery will be which way we’ll respond
"didn’t see that one coming"
or "we knew but didn’t do anything about it"

ginger is the star of these movies
fred is a special effect

the patient is quadriplegic
he has epilepsy, cerebral palsy
seizures, chronic aspiration
and he's blind
but mom has it down
she's always been on top of it
from day one (24 years ago)
why mom isn't running the world
instead of these evil bozos is beyond me

i live for music
but it’s undeniable
music is manipulation
roll over beethoven
roll over taylor swift
"i want to move people"
uh huh
move them to do what?
spend a few bucks?
worship you?
but i'm not talking to you
jeff beck
the man just wanted to play guitar
and **** did he

started three 12-hour shifts in a row
the hospital is home for the next three days
my actual house is now a hotel
sympathetic wife, cozy cats, comfy bed
but my interest and energy
my life force is here
it's a weird freedom
no one cares what i think or say
or even do
decent food, the soups are good
thrills and spills, dueling with disease
juggling the maladies of the patients
trying to make a dent in their suffering
smoking females underfoot
flashing eyes above masks
snug scrubs showcasing enticing rumps
fantasies on every floor
ahhh, the days of a healer
home again

as i play with the building blocks
of my perceptions and conclusions—
of course i’m an existentialist
i didn’t make the road
but i’m in the driver’s seat

gotta keep my eye on the ball
the big picture
i helped a bunch of folks to breathe
probably helped a couple to live
at least for one more day
so i worked too hard and long for a shift
no choice, boo-hoo
my skills were sharp
and my back was strong
i was worthy

a couple of homicide detectives
just showed up for my patient
his daughter shot him
he can't get an MRI
due to fragments from a previous gunshot
i wonder who shot him that time?
his mom?

today i'm in the ER
trying to treat an 89 year old woman
babbling in an obscure urdu dialect
that baffles her translator
her grandson found her so annoying
he locked her outside last night
in zero degree weather
first pushing her down
giving her a subdural hematoma
well, she is kind of annoying

the 85 year old man only fell down three steps
but he fractured everything and has a brain bleed
either he spends the rest of his life in pain and immobility
or there’s not much left of that life
either way
it all over for him

shootings, stabbings, drunken beatings
car accidents, covid, RSV
all in the last day and a half
gotta love working the holidays
in the emergency room
oh and here's a cardiac arrest
** ** **

it's very clear that i am the genius of me
it's also quite obvious that my uncanny insights
do not extend to anyone else

when i was a kid
i wondered what it would be like to be 40
now i can't remember being 40
i STILL don't know what it's like

drop a sock at 4:30 in the morning
soft landing, no damage
my wife sleeps on undisturbed

i’m suddenly in a ****** up situation
the patient is brought in tripping
the word is he took peytote
stopped his car, got out and proclaimed himself god
now he resides in the ER
he’d been tied to the cot but his nurse let him loose
"there’s no doctor’s order, i can’t restrain him"
strict regulations
he crawls out of bed and wobbles unsteadily down the hall
i get in front of him to block and redirect
but he’s not going for it
which puts me in an uncool position
he could start swinging on me
and he’s a big fella in good shape
if i respond he could fall and hurt himself
either way, i’m *******
i push him back into his crib
and strap him up anyway
a nurse who knows what she’s doing
says she’ll get a doctor’s order for restraints
once in bed, the guy is docile
"you want some ******?" he offers politely
"no thanks," i say
"i’m working"

admiring of the ladies
cordial to the fellas
dismissive of the management
indifferent to the work
on line for the coffee

what the world chooses
to reveal about itself
to any individual
is highly selective
idiosyncratic
you might call it a tease

if you decide to only worry
about things you can change
and when you analyze it
that’s not much
your worries shrink drastically
goodbye weather
goodbye world news
goodbye *******
goodbye fate