Porno scenarios presented themselves
then nothing happened. From the hall
I saw a young black man stripping
out of his pajama top and I thought
he was pretty. I thought “Hey, maybe
I’m gay or (as the ads say) ‘bi-curious.’”
A nurse gave me a rather tender
neurological exam, and when my penis stirred
in the thin pajamas, she left abruptly.
A woman who seemed to be a dumbed-down,
less attractive version of my wife murmured
“Do me” in passing. I paced the halls.
Faces unfroze when I glanced at them,
conversations began as I walked by.
I thought I was being punished
for staring at asses, strangely
enough, so I kept my eyes up. Also strange:
I envied the neckhair of one male nurse
who walked ahead of me. It was plush
as sheepswool, unlike mine, which scraggles.
Anti-psychotics made the hospital “The Wizard of Oz:”
Everyone reminded me of someone
else, or an aspect of myself, or
a reproach from a higher being.
I watched a basketball game with
a black man about my height. One
morning a nurse drew some blood
and I made a joke. She said
“That’s a good one” and smiled.
Her face seemed to be a vision
of what’s best in the world, simple
as the full moon. And I dimly remembered
a face from my diaper days: Ida,
the woman who took care of me
one day a week. Secondhand
I got a story from my mother: the KKK
chained Ida’s neighbor to the bumper
of a car and dragged him screaming
up and down the road, more or less skinning him
alive. People sat in their houses,
listening to the screams, terrified.
Then it was quiet. On a walk outside
I saw a seagull land by a red light
glowing on the hospital, I thought it was Satan
showing me his wingspan.