My darling, I’ve plied the true and saving grace
amongst recalcitrant hearts, recidivist kidneys
that sing the chronic song, wiped tears from faces,
measured liver spans as if they were bridges
and I were always spanning to you, to you.
I remember looking out the window of the ICU
and seeing the world, gold and green, women
with strollers, cars and plash, and there was love:
leveraged as the fallback plan, the one line held
or damn the campaign, there being no other side
to join.
I’m tired. My hands were in ten bodies today,
but this morning, I rolled over bad-back griefs,
stirred by the early AM alarm, and spied your face:
impassive, gently breathing. There is no way
to lie there and not be Herculean: able to wish
the massive hospital away, able to touch your hair
and multiply the wishes to a thousand, falling wide
and long off the mark.
My darling bride, wield
your beauty as surpassing, as your say:
I walk to the hospital with recalcitrant heart,
with wishes dwindling to a to-do list
that prepares me for the OR, for the wards,
for that window where South Street peeks out
and Halifax could be any other day, a different precipice.
I could be another man, broad and limber, tall
and fierce, withstanding pain; but I’m a doctor,
with catheters in the dam, the plash of blood
and the plash of wishes long fallen wide,
off the mark we made.