Jeff McCallum

Small talk

as we ride the cavernous patient only elevator

to pre-op

They no longer shave one

I discovered

wondering what new task had been assigned the body hair barber

if there were retraining programs available

why shaving was no longer required

The doors glide open at the closed

end of a drought brown corridor

revealing a incongruous stack of trash containers

boxes labeled medical waste mixed with recycling bins

along an otherwise unadorned wall

and then

a long

cold hall

lined with rows after row of beds

empty

forlorn

reminiscent of an overcast day at the impound lot

or the scrap yard

Between the beds three

deep on either side of the long

long corridor

piles of walkers and wheelchairs

wait like sad used vehicles on a dusty

dull

mid-town car lot

lacking only the Se Habla Espanol signs

There are so many

Are they back-ups

waiting for a disaster

vessels awaiting an official decommissioning

Is one of them mine

or do they

like the trash

simply wait for the rag man

Soon I will begin the short count

to the fast fade

somewhere between three and seven

Will I remember the caring hand of the med-surg nurse

clasping mine

the incongruous trash stacked neatly

at one end of a long dull passageway lined

with obsolete pieces

of someone else’s memories