The Nurse

by John Peter Beck

I am
surrounded.

We call it triage,
as if choosing who dies

is science more
than guesswork, taking

on powers divine,
wanting only miracles.

If he was a merciful god,
would he try us

and these patients so?
I no longer

sleep unless exhausted,
eat unless forced.

St. Camillus, you are the saint
of both nurses and the sick,

touching both sides of the bed,
both sides of the curtain.

You knew battles
where men sought to wound and kill
​
and those fights waged
to close the rent flesh,

fan the flagging spark
salvage the flickering spirit.

I am surrounded.
Help me

to go back
to the crowded floor,

halls overflowing,
the decisions that await.

---

John Peter Beck is a professor in the labor education program at Michigan State University, where he co-directs a program that focuses on labor history and the culture of the workplace, Our Daily Work/Our Daily Lives. His poetry has been published in a number of journals, including The Seattle Review, Another Chicago Magazine, The Louisville Review, and Passages North, among others.