Acreage of the Sick

The fluorescent hum is a low, vibrating wire

that connects the child I was to the person in this chair.

I look up at the tiles, a grid of white and fire,

and find the same water stain still hanging in the air.

It looks like a map of a country with no name,

a jagged, brown border on a field of pitted gray.

Thirty years of patients, but the ceiling is the same,

watching us lose our breath and find a way to stay.

I know every pin-hole and every dusty crack,

the geography of waiting while the stethoscope is cold.

It’s a strange sort of comfort, this habit of looking back

at the only part of the room that isn't allowed to get old.