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I flinch
as pain flows like a rivulet
in my punctured veins
when sterilised needles pierce
my skin, flesh, body, heart and soul
till red beads of blood ooze out
shining like pale rubies
and sweat appears like glass beads
gleaming on my fevered brow…
Abruptly awakened
by the probing fingers of
doctors draped in milk-white coats,
swarming around me like buzzing bees
stethoscopes dangling around their
stiff necks like serpentines.
I’m undressed under their prying eyes
examining my nakedness as if I’m a living specimen,-
while my face turns crimson in discomfiture -
So many wanted....unwanted tests,
X-rays and ECGs, B.P. checks and probes,
Pills and drips, Scans and M.R.I.s.
Saline drips like silent tear-drops…
as each fragment of moment
seems like frozen eternity…
As my numb sore body sinks
in the sea of starched sheets
and my aching head drowsily hangs
on the ripples of disinfected pillow while
Pallid, diseased white faces
like silent tombs gaze at me -
patients like fatigued pantomimes
perched in creaking wheelchairs
lost in a never-ending maze of identical corridors
where angels without wings tiptoe
with trolleys that squeak like rodents,
hurrying down the aisle -
to catch their pace
with grim-faced ghosts who walk
around in white-aprons…
I hear the noisy footsteps of visitors
chirping like chatterboxes
in the backdrop of moans and groans of patients -
their whines and whimper
reverberate in the walls of wrinkled nights
drowned by wailing sirens of an ambulance
somewhere far away,
while sleep plays hide-and-seek
with my stinging eyes
that blink with the fluorescent tube-light
flickering on the spotless wall
above my hospital bed.
The antiseptic whiff in my room suffocates me
and I long for gentle cool breeze
and golden sunshine showers
in verdant green lawn around my cosy home.
I crave for your heart-warming smile
and words of comfort with your healing touch.
My heart aches loud and eyes cloud,
tears overflow and everything is just a dull haze.
I die again only to be resurrected
by the angels of mercy,
and I realise that –
when life dies a thousand deaths
then death lives a thousand lives…
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