Trish Hopkinson
Aftermath: ~48 Hours
The hallways stink of chemical
cleansers & bleach, too bright,
brighter than the dim rooms
where vampires fill tubes with your blood
every four hours. I write
on the whiteboard: 4am blood test.
I write it in red. They take your blood
to a lab before they taste it. They season it
with salt for flavor—your sodium
entirely too low, your glands wrecked,
knocked senseless by pavement.
The nurses are confused. They think
you’re the monster. I think they are
Annie Wilkes. They tether your feet
to the bed & Velcro your wrists to rails
to keep you from pulling
staples out of your head
with your fingernails. They think
your chipped black nail polish means
you’re an angry young man.
They ask: Is he an angry young man?
I scream in my head: No, he’s a peaceful vegan.
The scream pounds the walls
of my skull with your fists.
Your head aches when Nurse Wilkes
is late. It hurts so much you cry.
I write it in red. I write the type
& time: Tylenol: 6am, 12pm, 6pm, 12am
Oxycodone: 8am, 12pm, 4pm, 8pm, 12am
Shift change: 7am / Doctors rounds: 9am
All must go on the whiteboard. All
staff names must be spelled correctly.
I fold down the back cushions
on the sofa & lie here
while you are still. Scrubs walk by
pushing a cart. I look at the clock:
4:13am. I look at the whiteboard.
A couple of hours before Tylenol,
I roll to my side & cover my feet,
close my eyes, look at the clock
& whiteboard. Scrubs walk by
without a cart. Machines hum.
Something beeps. I close
my eyes, look at the red.
Intensive Care
IV might fail heart rate might lower aide might be late for their shift man next door with whom you share a nurse might go into cardiac arrest just before your medication is due you might wake up angry you might wake frightened you might not I might stand bedside monitoring every machine listening in on the staff making sure to make sure breaks are important I’m sure I ate quickly in the cafeteria I’m sure my panic remained what if what might happen is preventable what if I’m the one to prevent it press the call button ask a question insist on another scan something as simple as walking five minutes away some small luxury becomes the split second shim between life & letting it slip
To My Unconscious Son
Is it wrong for me
to be grateful your face is unharmed?
You, laid out on a tilted hospital bed.
Me, not knowing where your mind is now
—if you are at all, if you will wake.
Your body will heal
if your brain does—the brace holding
your neck, mattress supporting your fractured
vertebrae and pelvis, pillow indented
where your skull has been sewn and stapled.
I’m selfish
in this moment, relieved even, that I can see
your calm expression without visible injury.
If someone saw you now, they’d think
you were sleeping; they’d not know
the peril your body is in,
wouldn’t know you aren’t dreaming—or are you?
Will you be able to tell me what you are thinking
if you are thinking at all in these hours
of absence from the living?
I didn’t know whom
to call this morning—extended family,
close friends. I know I should be telling someone
where we are, what has happened.
But I just want to wait—
I somehow don’t think
about the chance you may not be the same,
that the last time we spoke will have been
the last time. No, my imagination
won’t let me wander to the worst.
There seems no possibility
for any other outcome. I don’t stop
looking at you, your skin still warm, without
the paleness of one who is dying—somehow
that’s enough to let me know
here in this room
with the clock clicking and scent of disinfectant
—a mother and son alone but for the hum
of machines and shuffling of strangers
on the other side of the door and
the sunrise edging in.
Back to Life
You buy your first bicycle since the pickup truck assault.
It’s matte black, the color of asphalt.
You name it Deathwish.
I wish you’d named it Unridden.
You post photos of you standing beside it,
helmet on your head, six months healed.
Your sense of humor still intact. Mine, not so much.
I tell myself, your odds are better now. But odds
are not the same as probability. The risk
of being killed skydiving
is one in a hundred thousand.
Dying in a car? Fifteen times more likely
than on a bike.
What are the statistics
for outliving one’s children?
In 2015, there were 818 bicyclist deaths—
almost 819, still
less than 2% of traffic fatalities
but not less than the number of times
I feared
you wouldn’t make it home.
How many breaths did it take to revive you?
How many pumps on your chest?
Some stranger’s palm thrusting into your ribs,
their lifeline drawing your line of fate.
I’m relieved you can’t recognize
the one who saved you,
don’t remember
your body tossed into the air like a coin on a bet.
Note: These poems were previously published in A Godless Ascends (Lithic Press, 2024)
Trish Hopkinson is a poet and advocate for the literary arts. You can find her online at SelfishPoet.com and in western Colorado where she runs the regional poetry group Rock Canyon Poets and is a board member of the International Women's Writing Guild. Her poetry has been published in Sugar House Review, TAB: The Journal of Poetry & Poetics, and The Penn Review; and her most recent book, A Godless Ascends, is forthcoming from Lithic Press in March 2024. Hopkinson happily answers to labels such as atheist, feminist, and empty nester; and enjoys traveling, live music, and craft beer.
