For me it is a practical skill I must master
Healthy and muscled I trot the stairs
To her deathbed
People get addicted
To an illusion and the
Illusion
Kills them slowly
Because illusions are not real
Looking at her emaciation
Each vertebra clearly curled
She is a tiny fern
In a spiral on the bed
Bleached of nutrients
Heroin was her illusion
Each one has its signs
I see a tiny fragile child
Newborn kitten
Beginning and ending blurred
A good nurse teaching me today and a
Good hospital
She’s dying the nurse says
And gently guides my hands to tap the spine with a long grey needle and draw the fluid that will tell us
Uselessly
Of what else, because we all know
Why
All I remember, aside from the deft
Maneuver trapped in my hands
Is the love radiating from the nurse
Somehow this moment replaces all my judgements
Of this condition
Forever
Because I know how it ends now
Junky they call them
But at the end they are only our brothers
Beautiful forgiven children
And there is only love
For those who know they need it
But mistake
Its source