The Long Hall

The hospital,

its breath, thin antiseptic,

a coffee spill on the last shift.

I walked, past numbered doors,

each one a private world,

or just a waiting.

Fluorescent tubes

hummed above, a low, electric drone,

washing the linoleum

sickly yellow.

My own reflection,

stretched and warped, moved with me,

a ghost in cheap shoes.

Someone pushed a cart,

silent wheels, a whisper of plastic,

and I kept walking.

This corridor,

it had no end, just turn after turn,

like a sentence

without a period.

Just transit, always,

never quite arriving.