Hospice

He doze’s in a wing-chair, hears what visitors say when patients can be talked about. People speak well of the dying, even of dying strangers, people speak very well of the unknown. To him their words prematurely shovel earth. For the able-bodied death must be accommodated, penciled into time slots. Distracted workers must carry and fetch, update charts, check off last days. He listens as he slips downstream on a raft of morphine. These last trips he takes were written long ago by Mark Twain and Lewis Carroll. His own grave story has become frivolously ironic. He wonders if anyone can see the pinto rocking horse between his legs; wishes there were another rider to race with.