When I sleep, the right side of my bed is vacant.
An unused pillow an arresting reminder.

Blotters pad a barrier between gum and cheek,
sudden sharp stinging penetrates serial spots.
The needle mounts waves of pain but short,
temporary, an unwonted metallic taste, foreign,
abnormal. What is this flavour I suffer?

Senses are slowly sending, trending towards
tingling tongue and tooth, filling fractured, but only
a one-sided story: The right side
of my face has departed, banished into inner
or outer space, the left resides still.

Eyes close to blot out the harshness of
artificial lights, of probes and prods. Lids fail
to protect me, they project imagined green
against the blackness of my shutout sky. Clouds
mean someone peering in, pulling darkness in.

The nurse and dentist ask questions,
but how do you answer when your tongue
is wormlike, barred and blinded, and all
replies come out as the sound “rrmumbrry”
Are they taught to translate that language?

Broken, anaesthetized, repaired. A distraction.
Hearts are not so easy, valves can fail.
Strangers ask questions: "How are you traveling?"
Still here, stillness hears, silence harms. How
to reply, the heart hovers, untransplanted?

The autopilot answers “I’m alright” when
all is wrong. Numbness exacts its percentage,
desolation discerned, faced, inflicted, is not
forgiven. No presence knocks or kneads.
Absence surrounds, contained in a coffin.

I lie abed at night. The right side
of our couplet has uncoupled, banished
into inner or outer space.
...
I persist.

				  3 February 2024