Peak Intensities: A Doctored Pastoral
My husband comes nude into the house
every night, having shed the faded scrubs
in the garage where the washing machine
will soap them free of contagion. Over
his midlife belly, a field of divots
from a colectomy, cancer,
he lifts one unsheathed hand in greeting
across the measured distance of the living
room before disappearing upstairs to shower,
where the water runs peridot before clearing,
where the faucet hitches as if in breath. I hear
him coughing, too, this man, once so green
he believed there was hope
to be found in hospital. Now it’s hostile,
a place described as the “front lines,”
the rooms where he goes to do what
he has always done. How well he knows
what it is to battle for life. Later, sterile
as a single kiwi plant, he takes
the dogs for a walk safe enough away
from neighbors riding their bicycles.
This is the time of day we used to call golden,
tropical light curled over leaves closing up
for evening, the final gleam
projecting through spokes of wheels that look
as if they are spinning backwards, creating
a slide show we now need to believe to see.
