Code

Speaker-boxes

announce the code

 

through mesh worn

gray, public that

 

old man’s man-

whisp is septic,

 

sweaty, heaving

nonsense at no one—

 

he awakes and knows

he shits in bedpans,

 

incontinent,

viral through and

 

through but for

next-of-kin.

 

A flutter-rush of

white coats and shouts

 

“he’s in de-fib”

“push two”

 

as the old man

babies a handful

 

of bedsheets and

wonders at

 

the stars

in his eyes that

           

should be in

the sky,

 

the tubes inside

and out him,

 

childhood gods

and gargles

 

no words into

the ventilator.