A pain like the ripping
of a balloon's overstretched
sheath beneath my sternum
pressures me out of sleep.
Am I about to die? Is this how
it all ends at 2 a.m. when
the house is silent and there's
no traffic in the street?
In the bathroom still half
a sleep - half alive - I find
a full-strength aspirin
and flush it down wondering
if it's just indigestion,
tormented by the stereotype
of manly men toughing
out pain. There's no bulge
of bile, no burp of gas, but
worry says this is it!
So I grab my pants and keys
and drive to the hospital
stopping for lights rushing
less than my heart fearing
a lurch toward a telephone pole.
Wheelchair at the door
hospital gown cold antiseptic air
leads taped to my chest
blood pressure cuff beep beep
of heart monitor stick of IV,
all of which oddly calms
me with a reassurance
of accepting what I don't know,
trusting those who do, shedding
pride for vulnerability
as the sun rises like a bubble
from the darkness.
--
Eric Chiles is author of "What Was and Will Be" forthcoming from Resource Publications and soon available on Amazon and the chapbook "Caught in Between" (Desert Willow Press, 2019). Besides Disturb the Universe, his poetry has appeared in Allegro, Big Windows Review, Canary, Rattle, San Pedro River Review, and elsewhere. Grandfather to a dozen grandsons, he wishes he had a granddaughter.