Poems generated through visits to my wife, Vicki, at Clover Health Car may explain the forgetfulness.
INTERSECTION
Pressing the green button
while pushing
the right wing
of the wide double door
I gain entry
to the next unit
which seems to be
a four-way intersection for
wheelchair traffic
at the rush hour
although almost no one
is moving
as if I happened into
a still photograph.
Apparently there's no penalty here
for being asleep
at the wheel
and nurse pedestrians move freely
ignoring cross-walk restrictions.
I came as a taxi man to put
my wife's chair
in motion.
As usual she knows exactly
where
she wants to go
but as usual
neither of us has the fare.
BACKGROUND SOUND
In the Dublin Place common room
several women sit silent, sagging a bit,
perhaps asleep, in their wheelchairs.
One smiling lady follows her walker
aimlessly around the room. One woman
calls loudly for help, another, sunk
deep in an over-pillowed chair cries out,
repeatedly, and an unwanted analogy
crowds into consciousness: triage.
My wife sirs silent, uncomplaining, but
admitting to me her pain. On the wall
the TV plays endlessly, tuned too low
for me to hear, ignored as are the birds
singing vainly beyond the window.
