by Megan Williams
The day I almost die
I dream of a hotline
where a woman’s smooth voice whispers
you are in control.
Doctors bring orange, apple, cranberry juice
as if flavor is what stills my fingers
A nurse colors over nutrition facts
with thick black Sharpie.
My sister drank orange juice
every elementary school morning;
together we huddled on the furnace grate
waiting for the warm blast,
our father’s Low Heating Cost Commandment
lifted at 7 a.m.
My sister does not speak to me now.
Too painful, watching me decay.
Next, doctors bring plastic-wrapped
peanut-butter sandwiches. I am a dragon
who sits on a pile of school lunches,
I smile, blood dripping down my face.
Nobody laughs.
My sister would have laughed.
She would have chiseled away the crusts
of her Chocolate Fudge Pop-Tart, like always,
pressed them from her defrosting palm to mine.
There is no one I can call,
I inform the hospital psychiatrist.
I have withered my body to eternal winter.
1-800-URINCNTRL is not real.
I have ruined everything that is.
****
Megan Williams is a writer in Pittsburgh. Tweet her, and find her other recent publications, @megannn_lynne.