the orderly
am sitting on a tin chair outside the x-ray lab as
death, on stinking wings, wafts through the
halls forevermore.
remember the hospital stenches from when
was a boy and when I was a man and now
as an old man
sit in my tin chair waiting.
then an orderly
young man of 23 or 24
pushes in a piece of equipment.
looks like a hamper of
freshly done laundry
but I can’t be sure.
the orderly is awkward.
he is not deformed
but his legs work
in an unruly fashion
as if disassociated from the
motor workings of the brain.
he is in blue, dressed all in blue,
pushing,
pushing his load.
ungainly little boy blue.
then he turns his head and yells at
the receptionist at the x-ray window:
anybody wants me, I’ll be in 76
for about 20 minutes!”
his face reddens as he yells,
his mouth forms a down
turned crescent like a
pumpkin’s halloween mouth.
then he’s gone into some doorway,
probably 76.
not a very prepossessing chap.
lost as a human,
long gone down some
numbing road.
but
he’s healthy
he’s healthy.
HE’S HEALTHY!
Autres oeuvres par Charles Bukowski...
