An Earthquake During Surgery
I must make the most precise cuts
as the floor is shaking and the table as well
but this just the nature of my job and the planet
in twenty twenty five that we must work
in the midst of the turbulence and trembling
attempting to match the rhythm of the hand
with jerks and jolts of quaking walls
just to make a six millimeter long incision
in the inner lining of the right ventricle in the heart
that is pulsating unusually also with matching tremors.
these are unheard of conditions and yet
there is what is ideal which includes a room
that does not move at all and there is what is
occurring now which is the violent humming
chamber in which all of us operators are
attempting to patch a life up so that it exists
for at least another ten to twenty years
and I can say this is one of those nightmares
I had when I was in med school so long ago
where I woke up at four in the morning
next to my partner who also woke up
as I sat up like a lightning bolt and told her
that I had just had a horrible dream
where I was performing a ventriculotomy
on her heart and all of a sudden the ground
started shaking and my feet started sliding around
and I had to finish the surgery in the midst
of an earthquake before she died.