The hospital
is eerily quiet
at four-thirty in the morning.

Here I sit,
by your side,
listening to your haggard breathing-

-Realizing, knowing,
          had-known-all-along,
wish-I-didn’t-know,
Purposefully-forgetting
each one of these
could be your last.

Nurses on night shift pace back and forth.
White walls blend into
the white sheets, white bed…

          isn’t it kinda funny?
          that the place that delivers life,
          heals broken bodies,
          destroys cancers,

also delivers death?

The blank spaces all around the room
seep into my head;
Nurses on night shift
pace back
and forth,
back
and forth,

What are you feeling now? Can you
see me peering into your face,
can you
see me
staring at the foreign devices
glued to your skin, your mouth,
your chest?
Can you feel the white walls,
driving you to insanity-
        -aren’t asylum walls also white?
Can you?

Where are you now?
Is your mind drifting off to your fantasies?
Clench your fists more on the bed sheets-
flex your toes just a bit longer,
blink just a bit more rapidly,
        -Get me, out of here,
        get me, out of here,

Don’t lose consciousness as of yet,
don’t let the sweat stop rolling,
don’t let the muscles stop twitching,
I need you to stay alive,
alive,
ALIVE-

and if your violent heartbeat
comes to an end,

So will mine.