“stick…burn” the surgeon warned/as he injected yellow fluid into the hand

the local numbing agent acted quickly

an incision was made and spreaders made of it/a pair of conjoined parentheses

the surgeon deftly sliced compartmental tissue/that had impeded nerve transmission

soon he was satisfied with the loose weave/of the tissue

bound the parentheses back into a line/with internal stitches that were flesh-entombed

and two strips of surgical tape were crisscrossed over the cut

and gauze and an ace bandage completed the wrapture

.

nine days later here we are/and on the hand is a rorschach test of sorts

you may see a petroglyph of a coyote/or the trickster himself

it could be a pond in winter/or an ideogram meaning “desolation”

or a bridge or pier

but the patient sees “slow healing”/and reminds himself

to be a patient patient

cherry

between the surgical scars

nestled in the palmist’s map of divination

a cherry awaits placement among molars

there to be flex-pressed until she bursts

and cascades her flavor over a nimble tongue

that teams w/teeth to strip her stone of meat

the stone placed like a tongue-set jewel

and pluck’d by scarred-hand fingers

while the meat is sent for processing

to become an essential part

of a poet

fitted sheet tug-of-war

in less than two hours the doc will slice my hand and wrist

so clean sheets go on the bed NOW

and as always the fitted sheet tries to not live up to its name

making its mischief first by pretending to be Portrait when it is Landscape

then by spontaneously shrinking three millimeters so that tug mightily as you will the corners never quite line up

not without wrestling and tugging and mattress-lifting and knee-balancing and cursing

but there is some comfort with these machinations in having remembered to perform this uncomfortable task pre-op

and not with fresh incisions