The Halls

The first time Jo remembers opening her eyes,
she’s hoping the diagnosis is not malignant.
And then a doctor sighs and tells her to feel lucky
she walked the halls to arrive here for her consultation.

+

The second time Jo remembers opening her eyes,
she has, apparently, just completed her first round of chemo
and is off now, she’s told, rolling through the halls,
to a round of radiation, and Nurse says, she even agreed to

advance science by trying some promising new radio
-active pill. Even though she told them she couldn’t
remember what a name even was, let alone any record
she’d ever had one she might have called her own to sign off with.

+

The third time Jo remembers opening her eyes, her mind is bright again,
she can think, and some doctor is asking if she needs him to repeat his questions.
Did she want to try to ease the pain? Did she want a little something maybe? Juice?
Jo looked around at the panicked halls before answering, Just leave me alone

and give me something to help with the afterlife. // The last time Jo remembers
opening her eyes, all the ancestors are waiting, and Jesus is there,
but he’s only one amidst the crowd of un/familiar faces, and
none are sparkled in light, they’re hovering over the deep,

and then she’s the solar system,
and it’s the Fibonacci sequence,
and the seashell halls soon bear
witness to the end of her
suffering.