Nocturne
I linger on the lakeshore
Feeling the pulse of day grow faint.
The underbelly of clouds, wrinkled
Like desert dunes flipped on high,
Soak up pink and ochre
And spit out rays of gold.
The solar sarcophagus gravely sinks
And stars appear, shy then bolder,
Like distant kin at a wake.
My cat joins me on the shore,
Crouches to watch a chipmunk
Scuttle into the gaping body bag of night.
Teaching Rounds with Dr. Morgan
At six am we circled the bed of an elderly woman.
Taking her hand, Dr. Bill Morgan,
Who’d written our text on physical diagnosis said:
Here we are, my dear,
The roosters again.
How’d you sleep?
Any pain?
Breathing well?
Like goslings in short white coats,
Stethoscope amulets slung around our necks,
We imprinted his kindness and humor,
The benevolent mood.
Next, he chose one of us to perform the ritual of examination.
Alan drew the short stick.
Stepping forward, he introduced himself,
And began by palpating her abdomen,
Which gave like dough under his fingertips.
Then he sat her up to auscultate her lungs,
The shiny bell of his Littman
Hopping across and down the jagged ridge of her vertebrae.
It all looked very professional,
Except for the fact that Alan had forgotten
To put the earpieces of his scope
Into his ears.
Our laughter finally made him pause, straighten, and flush.
Mrs. Smith, he said, Would you mind if I try this
A different way?
No, she said. That would be fine.
I‘ve got nowhere to go but up.
The dying woman did not see him
Slip the prongs into his ears.
He lay her down to listen to her heart.
She smiled along with us,
As if floating in a warm pool,
Eyes closed.
The Sound of Branches Cut
I’m out pruning today, twenty pounds of girl-child
Lounging behind me in a red backpack,
The day pale but warm for February.
Crows call and arc across the blue between treetops.
I’m grateful the birds are so big and speak loudly
So she can follow my finger to them,
Get their shape and name planted among
The new articulations of her mind.
But she’s more impressed by my long-handled pruners.
She squeals as I snap off a pine sapling
And it slumps to the ground.
I was only going to tame a honeysuckle by the house—
Now we’re at the edge of the forest
Cutting everything that strikes me as
Superfluous, ugly, or just in the way.
It’s addictive.
And I know it has something to do
With the cluster of little tragedies
In the hospital of my livelihood
Last night.
Snap off a branch that brushes my head,
Slice through suckers on a dogwood trunk,
Everywhere I look there is more.
Anna plays with my ear.
Her fingernails bite like thorns.
I cut another pine and hear the way
Her brief cry follows the slice
As if giving the wood a tongue.
I snip again.
The same.
From treetops down the hill
The crows fly back.
I drop the pruners, point, give their name.
They cut across, so big and soaring,
Then gone.
I do not say how the pale blue nothing
They leave behind
Appalls me.
Photos by Frank J. Edwards