When I was a child, this awful heat
Would only show itself after extreme cold.
Have you even held snow barehanded?
Your hands start burning
And your body starts reacting like
It was always yearning for it.
Thursday felt like my nerves
Were barbed wires, the curtesy
Of being asked to sit felt like
A punishment.
Inextensible as they are,
It was as if I was getting lacerated
From all the pain.
Friday night, it was fever’s
Turn and it came in like a sea
Tide, a whirlpool that sank
Everything and broke every border
Of my body, starting an invasion.
Sunday: Doctor I have such and such,
It started with lacerations in my back,
And an attack on my immune-nation.
“Get these tests done and take these meds”,
Really Sir? At least feel my pulse.
I’d even appreciate a stranger’s touch.
Monday, my eyes heavy with anger,
A constant headache, a sluggish body,
Lightheaded, “here’s something for relief,”
go on zombie-head.
Tuesday morning, I was being
Turned inside out, wrung like laundry.
Chills that were strong enough
For an earthquake and a fever high
Enough to dehydrate me like a raisin.
In my delirium, dreams I’ve
Lost control of, no anchor
Point that fixates me and thus
Equally lost as anyone else
I’ve never had dreams like this…
It burns… It burns.
Like I am sleeping
On a bed of hot coal.
Is this the ascent?
Before we rise?
My body fuel to your furnace?
The tests? Nothing, three different
Doctors later, two cannulas
Six blood samples, four IVs later,
The fever? Didn’t leave.
DRINK MORE WATER, I was told.