First Flag

The cuff went tight, then loosened, then released.

The nurse made notes and left without a word.

The doctor circled something on the sheet

and said let's keep an eye—the kind you've heard

said to other people, not yourself.

Cut salt. Come back in three or four months' time.

He handed me the paper at the door.

I drove home through the slow midday climb

of traffic, the printout face-up on the seat,

the circled number in the afternoon sun.

Forty-two. First time anything was flagged.

I kept on driving. Didn't come undone.

My father had a phrase: the body keeps

its own accounts. He said it like the weather,

said it for a couple years before

the counting and the body came together

into something actual.

I didn't think of him inside the office.

I thought of him at every light going home.

His phrase. The circled number. Both on the seat.

The late light. The familiar road.

I haven't moved the printout.

I keep meaning to.