Being Sick at the Age of Old

Intro: The instruments of care have modernized past recognition; what a body reaches for in the dark, at home, has not.

By Vincent R. Pozon

Things have changed so in the business
of being sick, the days you dwindle
in bed, deliria as frequent bedside guests.

Where is the glass beaker of orange juice,
warmed by the morning blinking through blinds
made clattery when the fan looks your way?

And where is the glass straw, bent so
you can sip while whimpering as you lie?
Why is the mercury no longer shaken down?

A moan, at least, is still a summons. Moan,
and it insists itself through doors and walls,
A moan is a wound barked, audible

the way the surface of the sea carries words
farther than on land, moan, and they stumble
over to your side, moan and be loved.