While You Are in the ICU I Cannot Write
I cannot dredge up words,
blue suitcase stuffed with dirty clothes,
hotels and more hotels, 3 cities in 3 weeks,
every morning up early and off to the ICU,
where sometimes you eat a bit of what I bring.
A night of tears, I cannot stand the tube
that chokes your throat. You don’t remember
this; I remember everything. My rage when
they fail to read your chart and hurt you,
your confusion when you could not use your phone.
Long nights, the noise of the ICU, Baltimore’s
drug addicts waiting in the dark, predatory.
Early morning, they sleep on the streets as I walk
to the hospital, what is wrong with this city?
Your smile when I arrive each day.
So tired, my eyes won’t converge,
I’m awake, then not, the car in the ditch,
one tire blown, ripped undercarriage,
an apt metaphor for our lives now,
I could have killed someone. Or myself.
This is about me, not about me, it should be
about you, but also about us, our synapses,
our coming together and falling apart. You write
“a man unfinished,” in the margin of a notebook,
you can’t remember where I am.
Three weeks, a tube drains out your skull,
what day is it, they ask, what month, who is the president,
wake up, they say, do you remember where you are?
You say, “a hospital?” You say, “Baltimore?”
And then to me, you whisper low, “Surreal.”
Kathryn Temple
Kathryn Temple teaches at Georgetown University and lives on the Chesapeake in a small town south of Annapolis. The author of two academic books and a number of academic essays, she has published in The Inflectionist Review (nominated for “Best of the Net”), Poetry Superhighway, and Petigru Review, among others. When she’s not working, she tries to keep the ducks off the dock. You can find her at medium.com/@templek and kathryntemple.academia.edu.
