Gerard Sarnat

OUT OF THE BOX

Listen to the audio version.

Wily Old Fox

Fourteen steep stairs,
I barely heard our adult
children stare and compare
to their houses. One whispered
about not so cheap elevator chairs,
which I was unaware of at the time
because it could not quite be lip read.
(My wife told me right after they left.)
But only this septuagenarian had the wits
to exalt, Let's install an ice box down here!
thus dodging forbidden words: Nursing home.

* * *

Dreamscape #37

Waking
to everyone I cared about
gathered
for what could be
assumed
an 100th birthday party
celebration
that is until a daughter, also an MD,
removed oxygen tongs,
injected
something into the IV
sat down
bedside, took my pulse.

Gerard Sarnat MD's been nominated for Pushcarts. Kaddish for the Country was selected for pamphlet distribution on Inauguration Day nationwide. "Amber Of Memory" was the single poem chosen for his 50th Harvard reunion Dylan symposium; The Harvard Advocate accepted a second. Gerard's a physician whose built/staffed homeless clinics, a Stanford professor/healthcare CEO. Collections: Homeless Chronicles (2010), Disputes (2012), 17s (2014), Melting the Ice King (2016). www.gerardsarnat.com. Married since 1969; he has three children, four grandkids.