A heart monitor fugue

relatives

gathered, clustered

flies around a decaying

carcass, not trying to lay eggs

and breed into the corporeal new year

but rather each trying to out-

comfort the others with

their own pips and

squeaks as the

machines

that help him

say what little

he has left

do the

same

there is something solid in this querelous bleep.

the machine keeps what little snippet of time that

the dance has left to run, running through a last few

thespian twists, a final word or phrase now the

therapy is officially over and all

the drugs have been removed from the lines and his quacks

they shake their heads and mutter the platitudes that

they say every time a man with dementia has

the temerity to die on their watch and ruin

their quotas

beep

beep

fucking bloody bastard beep

i am millimeters away from putting my foot through that fucking machine

medical science and dignity are so completely incompatible sometimes

it’s a wonder we bury anyone at all

i didn't cry when we packed you off

into the home and i didn't cry when

i came to see you and we talked as

men and i don't cry now i see you sit

like a deflated gunny sack that waits

for the reaper's fist but goddamn it

when i saw it take you for the first

time and you pulled the sheet up over

your head like a child and hid from

the world in shame or fear (i really

couldn't tell which) i felt that after i

left that i should have cried and still

i didn’t, you didn’t teach me to cry

and you were right.

‘save your tears for those who truly need them’

ninety four years old

built out of rawhide leather

and piss and vinegar, as tough

as men ever fucking came, you beat

the great depression through pure sweat

and bloody minded drudgery and unyielding

force of will because you had a young family to feed

and now it kills me to see you lying on sheets

with watermarks on them just in case some

low-life bastard tries to run off with the

linen, cast down into ignominy and

shattered and sad and going

nowhere but a lift ride

down into the

basement

i hope you've made your peace

old man there's precious little else

you can make now you are a broken doll

and have the bladder of a drunkard and the

mind of a moron and machines make sure

you'll see tomorrow - that is, at

least until we turn the

bastards off.

which we are here to do.

watching as your

scriverner’s

palsy

and

broken

brain

and

miserable

corpus

betray

you

.

.

.