In the Bardo
It’s visceral, primitive
checking my husband in
at the VA
a wilting garden
of half-dead men
weaving their way through catacombs
slung over crutches
or their mates,
foot soldiers
barely ambulatory
brandishing canes and walkers
and my man’s doing the 90-year-old shuffle
his bad dream joke.
In this bardo
between then
and tomorrow
between today
and somewhere outside flesh
a space only a demon god
could hold for a anyone,
no matter how old
how battle-scarred,
the wounds wind around
the building
The wounds scream
limp
roll their tongues
around cries
that fall
on the ground
with curdled spittle
The wounds inhabit corridors
between beige walls
and echo of wars
that chewed them up
and spit them out.