RECOVERY

Recovery
Age 65, Sealevel, North Carolina, 2010
Snug Harbor Retirement and Post Operative Recovery Facility
after hip replacement surgery
-- This is one poem, from my autobiographical series of poems, that I posted here at WriteSpike. Go to my Stories section for others. They are in chronological order. --

Not far from Limbo and the River Styx
my feet are propped
in my motorized lounge chair

I am a shadow of myself

"You are young," my doctor tells me,
"only 66
- the bone will grow
and wrap itself
around the spike of metal
pounded and glued into your leg -
it will feel natural in a few months."

Cradled in my wheelchair
I test the hallways -
dark labyrinths
where the elderly roll by
in slow motion

We are letting nature take its course

The faint legato Muzak of
Somewhere Over the Rainbow
follows us

We are all waiting

Like ghosts or angels, dozens of women
appear and disappear -
temperature, pills, shots, blood pressure, food -
many forget to wear name tags
so I learn to know them by their clothing
fish, birds, tigers, giraffes

On my large TV
film noir shadows
crawl across the criminals
black and white cowboys ride off

I fall asleep when the flow of female voices
outside my door quiets -
in my dreams I see Achilles
he walks on the river
and beckons

I wake to the metal clang of carts
and the dark mother of pearl sky
that leaks into my room in the morning

Here darkness and light almost merge

And then I remember what
Achilles told me,
"You still have work to do."

With his assurance my bones relax
- I will find my place back in the world outside -
so for now I decide to catnap

Until the muffled bell rings
and I wheel my way to breakfast