When it came,
we had just changed the diaper —
a lame insurance
for another three or four
hours. He was sleeping,
and his chest quivered a flat land.
The IV drip flinched
at headlights from the window
stroking the walls. When he opened
his mouth, it was to die.
His last breath
swallowed the walls.
A glass dropped from a hand,
and rolled its red straw
under the bed.
The nurse, with chipped ice
crowding her white clogs, stood
like the tallest tree
in the middle of a storm.
With lightning.
Arlene Ang lives in Spinea, Italy. She is the recipient of The 2006 Frogmore Poetry Prize and serves as a poetry editor for The Pedestal Magazine and Press 1. Her chapbook, Secret Love Poems, is available from Rubicon Press. More of her writing may be viewed at http://www.leafscape.org.
