Old Fritz, on this rotating bed
For seven wasted months you lay
Unfit to move, shrunken, gray,
No good to yourself or anyone
But to be babied—changed and bathed and fed.
At long last, that’s all done.
Before each meal, twice every night,
We set pads on your bedsores, shut
Your catheter tube off, then brought
The second canvas-and-black-iron
Bedframe and clamped you in between them, tight,
Scared, so we could turn
You over. We washed you, covered you,
Cut up each bite of meat you ate;
We watched your lean jaws masticate
As ravenously your useless food
As thieves at hard labor in their chains chew
Or insects in the wood.
Such pious sacrifice to give
You all you could demand of pain:
Receive this haddock’s body slain
For you, old tyrant; take this blood
Of a tomato, shed that you might live.
You had that costly food.
You seem to be all finished, so
We’ll plug your old recalcitrant anus
And tie up your discouraged penis
In a great, snow-white bow of gauze.
We wrap you, pin you, and cart you down below,
Below, below, because
Your credit has finally run out.
On our steel table, trussed and carved,
You’ll find this world’s hardworking, starved
Teeth working in your precious skin.
The earth turns, in the end, by turn about
And opens to take you in.
Seven months gone down the drain; thank God
That’s through. Throw out the four-by-fours,
Swabsticks, the thick salve for bedsores,
Throw out the diaper pads and drug
Containers, pile the bedclothes in a wad,
And rinse the cider jug
Half-filled with the last urine. Then
Empty out the cotton cans,
Autoclave the bowls and spit pans,
Unhook the pumps and all the red
Tubes—catheter, suction, oxygen;
Next, wash the empty bed.
—All this Dark Age machinery
On which we had tormented you
To life. Last, we collect the few
Belongings: snapshots, some odd bills,
Your mail, and half a pack of Luckies we
Won’t light you after meals.
Old man, these seven months you’ve lain
Determined—not that you would live—
Just to not die. No one would give
You one chance you could ever wake
From that first night, much less go well again,
Much less go home and make
Your living; how could you hope to find
A place for yourself in all creation?—
Pain was your only occupation.
And pain what should content and will
A man to give it up, nerved you to grind
Your clenched teeth, breathing, till
Your skin broke down, your calves went flat
And your legs lost all sensation. Still,
You took enough morphine to kill
A strong man. Finally, nitrogen
Mustard: you could last two months after that;
It would kill you then.
Even then you wouldn’t quit.
Old soldier, yet you must have known
Inside the animal had grown
Sick of the world, made up its mind
To stop. Your mind ground on its separate
Way, merciless and blind,
Into these last weeks when the breath
Would only come in fits and starts
That puffed out your sections like the parts
Of some enormous, damaged bug.
You waited, not for life, not for your death,
Just for the deadening drug
That made your life seem bearable.
You still whispered you would not die.
Yet the nights I heard you cry
Like a whipped child; in fierce old age
You whimpered, tears stood on your gun-metal
Blue cheeks shaking with rage
And terror. So much pain would fill
Your room that when I left I’d pray
That if I came back the next day
I’d find you gone. You stayed for me—
Nailed to your own rapacious, stiff self-will.
You’ve shook loose, finally.
They say this was a worthwhile job
Unless they tried it. It is mad
To throw our good lives after bad;
Waste time, drugs, and our minds, while strong
Men starve. How many young men did we rob
To keep you hanging on?
I can’t think we did you much good.
Well, when you died, none of us wept.
You killed for us, and so we kept
You, because we need to earn our pay.
No. We’d still have to help you try. We would
Have killed for you today.