A Few Scenes from My Life at Work

BEING A NURSE



when they burst in on him

he jumped out the window
the mob caught him
and left him dazed and bleeding
naked in the street
in the hospital
the night shift heard
there were death threats
and pushed furniture
against the back door
of the nursing unit
in the morning
one of the two policemen
takes off his kevlar vest
my patient is impassive
and silent
I rub lotion on his back
and put vaseline
on his puffy lips
he says thank you
out at the station
they say
oh that one's yours
how could someone do that
to a five-year-old girl

Amazing,
said the former Barbeque King,
looking up with his sweet smile
from where he'd fallen in urine,
after all that's happened to me,
how many people
still
want
to come by and talk.

HOME CARE WITH AN OPEN WINDOW

Bone-deep pressure sore.
Waved away again, two flies
land on his penis.

Isolation room,
fourth floor: ladybug enters
on my yellow gown.




Waking in the light
from the bathroom 
as the nurse empties his urinal,
he recalls his diagnosis.

To the east, 
on the marshes 
between route 2 and the lake,
so many ducks, 
down from the flyway, 
drift on dark water.