there is no justice in medicine

 

a film of decay hugs

uncomfortably elegant brassbuttoned chairs and

watercolor prints of

lighthouses, giving this place of

healing

an unwelcome volatility.

 

we’re all slowly dying of something

, wishing away atrophy with

four-month-old magazines and ibuprofen.

waiting to be               pushed

farther back into

cloistered rooms, where undeserved pain is discussed in private | as

if seclusion somehow makes

us less pathetic. and

we’ll turn our heads and

cough for the doctor

but

 

we just came to get our throats scraped.

we just came to learn about garlic and bananas.

 

no coat is white enough

to retard the choler bubbling up in

our bellies and splattering the

eggshell walls.

 

there is no justice in medicine.

 

jonathan d baker 10 14 04