Consider This

Gerald Anderson

you lie on the floor in the treatment room,
strapped to the papoose board,
wrapped in canvas and Velcro tape,
your eyes sunk under weak lids,
your thighs held tight together.
You scream, jerk back your head,
scream again, working your jaw.

The digging noted, the smears and blood
cleaned, the nurse called,
the board installed-these fall
in place as ordered as the change
of shifts, the cycle of laundry,
this season of scudding leaves,
this swing round the pole star.

Bound by the board, the room,
the body with its too-small holes,
the dream from which you will wake
only into the deepest sleep,
you will try again tomorrow.
You wear darkness like prickly heat.

In thirty minutes you are released
to feel the way to your room,
to pause by the open window
where the moon in its tight orbit
holds coyotes to the rim of the near ridge
making the cold night thick with their cries.

With a drug to dull the crispness
of sheets, you will dig into sleep
like the slow push of a glacial stone.