Each breath a stab in the back.
You are phlegm—rattling and ridiculous,
your brain is a scar,
your eyes dried fruit in their husks.
You remember that all the bestsellers
were about heaven not long ago,
and you manage a thought:
Why not heaven? Why live here,
steaming the linens with fever,
taking oxygen in ragged gasps,
afraid to assume the fetal position?
You are sure you’re enclosed in a giant’s fist.
The squeeze of his toying hand
will snap what’s left of your ribs.
Why not the movie-set light
and Jesus, bearded and sandaled,
down the end of the short corridor?
It’s not that you want to die
or think you will die;
you aren’t that stupid yet.
It’s this hell-thirst and the yellow of the
walls that were ivory yesterday.
It’s this box, the airless shut-up finality.
You want to float, blinded—
the light down the hall
is so bright, like a near star—
and meet Jesus on the other side.
He will smile his Sunday-school Saint Hippie smile,
and hand you a cherry Coke poured over
crushed ice: the syrup of redemption.