noisy, pesky, restless kids--screaming, running, laughing. (ignorant of pain, of suffering, of unshed sorrow.)

deadened faces, staring into nothing. (what goes on behind those blank stares?)

unkempt hair, spick and span. (the two completely mismatched.)

hushed voices. fatigued dozes. (the rat race niggers, niggers, niggers on. round and round the wheel goes round, round, round. incessant at the back of your mind?)

(but what else can you do 'cept wait?)

machines beep on indifferently. (they tell you if they're dead or alive.)

(a LOUD! awful sound! but oh, that's just a cough. maybe a heart attack.)

those of the newer occupants bound in anxious footsteps.


scenes from the ICU.


a trio prayed. Father, we take comfort in you ... Your Will ... You know ... .
"God bless you." sure.

but what about the faithless; where do they turn?



in the quiet, basement corridor, a woman wept into a sodden tissue. "my precious baby," she sobbed. around her shoulder laid a mindless arm, the girl with red-rimmed eyes listened, defeated. (what else was there to say?) she too had cried, but now her tears were dry; she stared with the glazed look of a storm that came and went, fast and furious, unregistered.