Same Tiles

I lay back and the paper crinkled—

that sound. I was nine.

Not now: something wrinkled

into the present. The fluorescent line

of light above. The tile.

The brownish stain in the corner

I'd spent so much time with as a child—

making it a dog, a border,

a shoreline of somewhere.

Anything to last the wait.

Today I lay back. The same air,

same flat light, same weight

of nothing to do but look.

The stain the same rough brown.

Maybe not the same room. It took

a moment to settle down

into the one I was in.

The doctor came. Routine.

She spoke. I answered. Breathe in.

I kept looking at the brown ring.

The same ceiling, more or less.

I sat up when she said to.

The paper crinkled. I got dressed.

The stain still there. Still new

to me, somehow. Still a shape

I couldn't name.