drained
Clear plastic wrapping crinkles and crunches as you untwist the ends at the rows of red dots.
Pink, yellow, purple, blue, green, and white pastel pills are stacked atop on another.
They call them Smarties.
We called them cures.
“Take four pink for an ear infection, two green for strep, three purples and a white for heartburn, yellow and pink for tummy trouble,” nurses Rachel and Caroline say.
The patient, a young redhead is flayed on the gray sheep blanket, arms and legs spread awkwardly awry. She feigns a tummy ache, a headache, heartburn, invented illnesses and symptoms.
Her younger nurses hand her pill after sugary pill.
When you’re young, sugar and candy can cure anything.
The gooey and powdery sweetness slides down your throat, calming every pocket on the way down.
Pop down another pill when the pain returns.
Sister nurses are capable of healing all the fake pains.
Then you grow up.
Suddenly sugar is replaced by alcohol.
A cigarette.
Lust.
Nameless and faceless boys whom you wake up next to.
Hope that as you creep out of the bed they don’t wake.
You can’t bear the pride, the awkwardness, the surprise in their eyes.
You become the casualty trying to soothe your spirits.
Reverse the spoiled milk of your soul.
The nurses are no longer in the bed next to you in your childhood room.
Cures seem galaxies away.
Yet they are buried there in your soul,
waiting for the drought when your spirit runs out and you must reckon with the pride and conquer it.
Sometimes you are asked to be
The nurse.
Not the patient.
Not the victim.
Life isn’t as easy as sugary Smarties.
We didn’t invent a Smartie anecdote for heartbreak.
For pain.
For desolateness.
For isolation.
We must learn to be steadfast.
Stones.
Shoulders.
Soft-spoken words.
Strong spirits.
Pink, yellow, purple, blue, green, and white pastel pills are stacked atop on another.
They call them Smarties.
We called them cures.
“Take four pink for an ear infection, two green for strep, three purples and a white for heartburn, yellow and pink for tummy trouble,” nurses Rachel and Caroline say.
The patient, a young redhead is flayed on the gray sheep blanket, arms and legs spread awkwardly awry. She feigns a tummy ache, a headache, heartburn, invented illnesses and symptoms.
Her younger nurses hand her pill after sugary pill.
When you’re young, sugar and candy can cure anything.
The gooey and powdery sweetness slides down your throat, calming every pocket on the way down.
Pop down another pill when the pain returns.
Sister nurses are capable of healing all the fake pains.
Then you grow up.
Suddenly sugar is replaced by alcohol.
A cigarette.
Lust.
Nameless and faceless boys whom you wake up next to.
Hope that as you creep out of the bed they don’t wake.
You can’t bear the pride, the awkwardness, the surprise in their eyes.
You become the casualty trying to soothe your spirits.
Reverse the spoiled milk of your soul.
The nurses are no longer in the bed next to you in your childhood room.
Cures seem galaxies away.
Yet they are buried there in your soul,
waiting for the drought when your spirit runs out and you must reckon with the pride and conquer it.
Sometimes you are asked to be
The nurse.
Not the patient.
Not the victim.
Life isn’t as easy as sugary Smarties.
We didn’t invent a Smartie anecdote for heartbreak.
For pain.
For desolateness.
For isolation.
We must learn to be steadfast.
Stones.
Shoulders.
Soft-spoken words.
Strong spirits.