A two-roomed vestigial,
sandwiched between giants:
the house she didn't want to leave,
with its wooden screen door, torn
mesh flapping, its lime green
linoleum pieced together under years'-
worn braided rag rugs, plastic
sheeting tacked over her windows'
view of poured concrete glass; where
she sat upright, behind the bedroom
door, waiting for evening to issue her
daughter home to cook their meal on a
cast-iron stove (the type now back in
fashion), her elephant feet spilling over
loosely knitted slippers, her gravelly
voice propelled by a gargoylian
tongue (emerging as a dogfish from the
ocean), and her facial pallor so
cold; where the home lab
arrived for blood;
where the internist phoned
to promise a better life, with
CT scans and interns and IV
fluids and bromocryptine and
radiotherapy and a hospital bed
in a white room clad with fear.
Ruth Elwood Martin Department of Family Practice University of British Columbia Vancouver, BC