Posted by Atticus on August 10, 2004, at 13:07:03
Almost 6
The sky is viciously slashed
Into a thousand thousand
Azure-blue
Diamond-shaped shreds
Of raw stratospheric meat
By the crossed wires
Of the screens
Between me
And the window pane.
The probing fingertips
Of my right hand
Wriggle into the spaces
In the steel grid
Coated
In decades
Of paint and pain,
But cannot touch
The sun-warmed glass
Beyond.My left fingers
Are hooked
Over the neck
Of a pale blue
Hospital gown
That matches the color
Of my eyes
With uncanny precision,
And helps me
Hold aloft
A wrist and forearm
With ragged furrows
Plowed
Into the veins and tendons
By a box-cutter plowshare,
Lessening
The throbbing pain
Under the dressing.I pace
Along the barrier,
Rubber-soled socks
Padding like paws
On gold-flecked
Squares of white linoleum,
Bathrobe dangling
Like a cape
Because I'm still
Under watch,
And the ribbon of fabric
That serves as the belt
Is kept
Beyond my grasp
Like the late-spring air
Just inches away,
Just a billion miles
Away.A clock hanging high
On the wall,
Protected from me
By a bubble
Of plastic,
Ticks closer
And closer
To 6 p.m.,
When the visitors
Will file in
And the petting zoo
Will open
With us
As the featured
Attractions.My eyes trail down
To find Eleanora
Watching me,
All of 16,
Her long blond hair
Matted and tangled
Like my own
Dark thatch.
We both arrived,
Life's roadkill,
Late the same
Wednesday night,
Massive steel doors
Sliding shut behind us,
Letting us know,
In the quietly thunderous language
Of metal,
That we were now
Officially citizens
Of the ward.
Jesus, I'd thought,
She's just a kid,
As we slumped on a bench
For an entrance interview
With a nurse,
Both of us
Wrapped
In worn blankets
Against the chill
Permeating every inch
Of our tiny new world.Dozens of minute slashes
Decorated her wrists,
The unique ritual scarring
Of the tribe
To which
We now belonged.
Her cuts
Were too shallow
To strike the mother lode
Of blood in the
Delicate blue filaments
Wending their way
Up from her hands
To her elbows.Almost exactly half my age,
But our expressions identical,
Stunned to find
That the paths
Of our lives
Had led us
To such a place.
"Is it just me," I finally said,
"Or do you feel
Like we just joined the cast
Of 'Girl Interrupted'?"
A smile
Split a face
Carrying eyes puffy
From crying,
Radiant
In the shadowy corridor.
And we chattered,
In hushed tones
Suitable for a church,
About how utterly bizarre
It was
That we'd ended up
On this bench.Yet oddly,
In the days
That have followed,
I sometimes find
Something
Oddly liberating
About this place,
Where I feel
So child-like,
Where virtually everything
Is completely beyond
My control.
We're told when to get up,
When to sleep,
When to eat,
When to shower,
And handed
Little paper cups of meds
From a cart,
As if they were treats
From the Good Humor man,
Distributed by nurses
Who smile and nod
Reassuringly.
I tell Eleanora
The cart should play music
And ring a little bell
To bring us running,
And she likes this idea.But now
It's almost 6,
And Eleanora
Pats my right arm,
Her shiny little scabs
Catching bits of sunlight,
Because she knows
How anxious
I get
When this hour
Rolls around
And I may
Have to face
My family
And try
To explain
All this.She unhooks my fingers
From the screen
Like someone loosening
The claws of a cat,
Taking my hand
And giving it
A sisterly squeeze.
Her gray-blue eyes,
Made slightly hazy
By her meds,
Speak silently,
Telling me
I'll be OK,
They won't hate me,
They won't fear me,
They won't reject me,
But still,
I find myself torn
Between longing to see them
And hoping
They'll never come
And see me
Like this.I grin, just a little,
When I notice
She's toting the cartoon
I drew with crayons
Of her pet rat
In a monocle,
Top hat, and tails.
"I can't wait
To show my mom,"
She says,
And skitters toward
The great steel doors
By the reception area.
I hear the electronic buzz
As the doors open and shut,
Open and shut,
To let people in,
Knowing that if I were there,
I'd glimpse
The security guard
Standing
Just beyond them
In my old world.I shuffle
From the window
Down the corridor
And turn a corner
To unexpectedly
Find myself
Mere feet
From my mother
And my sister,
Their backs to me
As orderlies
Search the bags
Of clothing
They've brought
To replace
The shirt cut off me
In the ER,
And the discarded jeans
Stiffened with dried maroon blood.We catch sight
Of each other,
And I almost
Turn and run,
Wrestling with this impulse
As they stare
At a face once familiar
Now recast
In an alien glow,
A "Close Encounters
Of the Third Kind" moment
Tinged both
With intense curiosity
And a flicker
Of dread.We move toward a table
In the cafeteria,
The eyes and ears
Of parent and sibling
Darting and listening
To the other families
For cues
About how
To handle
This conversation.Eleanora runs up
With her mother in tow,
Flashing the cartoon
And introducing me.
I self-consciously
Move my left arm
Behind my back
And warily
Shake her mother's hand.
"See what he drew for me?"
She asks,
Displaying the picture,
And my own mother's reaction
Finally leads me
To lower my guard.
In the artwork,
She sees
A piece of the past,
The sketch a roadmap
Back to known
And shared territory,
Something her son
Used to do
For his little brother
On long car trips.My mother extends her hand
Tentatively
And grips my own.
"How do you feel?"
She asks,
And,
My eyes damp,
All I can think
To answer is
"Better."
-- Atticus
poster:Atticus
thread:376045
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/write/20040729/msgs/376045.html