He Looks for Evidence

He looks for evidence.

Signs of life.

Symbols, portents,

Voices he’d recognize.

Attached monitors and their strange beeps,

Abatement of panic and terror;

These could help him know where he stands

Or if his hour has already passed.

He looks for evidence.

He remembers things that cannot be,

While forgetting things that must be:

Time of day, his body’s location in space.

His breath comes fast, labored.

The monitors speed up

Like terrified, wild horses.

A doctor speaks emphatically,

A nurse holds back tears

(“We’re going to lose this one!”)

He looks for evidence.

It is not possible to move;

Only to suffer this suffocation,

Head spinning out towards dark stars,

Hands flailing like angry crows’ wings.

“What is my name?” he wonders.

Someone is calling, “Jacob? Jacob?”

Who is that? Could that be me?”

His voice is gone anyway, no sound.

He screams silently.

He looks for evidence.

He looks for evidence he is still alive.

A light shines toward him,

At the end of an endless tunnel.

He goes toward that in his imagination;

Because it has warmth — human warmth.

(“But if I go; will I return?”)

He looks for evidence.

Moment-by-moment,

He fights for his life,

Wrestles this choking undertow

Yet, he has to surrender, as well —

The virus is already inside him.

No turning back.

He looks for evidence.

Now, the bed, the hospital room, the universe;

It’s all spinning out of control,

All coordinates vanished.

‘He’ has become this vortex,

This movement away from warmth, Earth, Life.

All that remains is to become the letting go,

Become the falling away,

He looks for…nothing.

And out of the void,

A silent voice calls his name.

Evidence.