Needle sticks and night call,

Hep B burrowing skin,

bad smells, deep wounds,

death, dying, dead wood

at committee meetings,

downward mobility,

delinquent dictations,

Medicare audits, M&M

conference, ombudsmen,

bureaucrats, fucking

bureaucrats, disease advocates

stretching my day

an hour past dark—

but these are nothing

compared to the dismal,

distorted lens

Medicine clamps on

our eyes, the vision

of life as disaster—

motorcycles as donor devices,

rock music and hearing loss,

sunshine and skin cancer,

deer and Lyme disease,

ice cream and steak

just preludes to the CCU.