Balance, he thinks, driving house
to house. I’m minister to both,
and how I love their need. One’s cough,
fluttering up from narrow bones,
answers the other’s ripped voice.
He loves entire and separately.
To his first she he carries easy
words and oranges. His other
gets tea, honey, and other words.
Sustained between that pair
of shattered breaths, he sits by each
familiar sickbed, serious places
from a better time. Eucalyptus drops,
grim syrups, kleenex shredded
under soaked pillows, the gentle
incoherence of illness he can reach,
maybe heal, in hours gorged
and slashed with faithful use.
