Camel-colored corduroy, light wood
As comfortable as a chair in a waiting
Room of a diagnostic center can be,
The center of each chair sinking
With the invisible weight of bad news
Shadowed walls -- fluorescent lights
Surrounded by glass windows (it's going to rain!)
Making it impossible not to notice
Grey skies, dying trees
Is there really healing in a place with no feeling?
Chattering of the women behind, in front
Surrounding (no, those pink pills are for evening)
They're here every week -- used to fading
Family in the corner
Fear radiating
In the shaking of the knees, the hand
Running through a father's brown hair
Pacing -- new to the waiting
Pounding head matches pounding heart
Pounding veins (the door
Is flung open) (anderson!)
Not the right name
Another minute still to dream
Of new diseases unknown cures
An alien baby with six fins
Growing in my thyroid,
Maybe a new form of mad cow disease
Has it really only been fifteen minutes?
Man with sunken eyes, shriveled hands
Staring at me, whispering to his nurse
That I'm a demon red (don't mind him)
His wife has cancer and his body's dying
Thank the black woman turning the tv to silent
No one wants to hear about politicians' affairs
While they're waiting for their cure
Or diagnosis
Marean, sarah? sarah? once twice
Flashing orange
Second door on the left
The left, the left -- okay, lay on the
Plastic (how's middle school?)
I'm 20.
Then a long-haired woman hovering
Lights out
Blue glare of screen
Memorizing past accidents, unnatural
Genes (how's the ankle)
Aches on snow days
(Take this towel put your head back
Don't move have you done this
Before?)
Expecting to feel a cold gel
But instead having an almost-
Liquid that shocks the skin -- pour on
The throat, torturing the nerve endings
Heated
No further description or
Terms of consideration (violation)
Plastic scanner pressing,
Digging into the esophagus, )(just
Sit still shhhh )
Like thick, rough fingers
Fingers scratching, squeezing
Choking -- panic (don't panic)
Resisting the urge to claw, white spots
Don't fight (silence)
Breathing
Fists clenching tightly
Woman's eyes changing, medusa
Coming alive in a
Spinning room
No breath
Falling
.
Door opening, flash of green
Fingers disappear to a cart being
Wheeled away
Neck (throbbing)
Machine blue screen flipped off
Now that wasn't so bad, was it?
Jump up, coat on running out
The door to the safety of a
Car with yellow lights, results by
Friday (smells likes rain)
Trees skies dead grey
Still
