The Anesthesiologist

To a door between sleep and death I hold the key.Like soiled clothes before a bath you'll shed your pain,Stripped to a cotton gown and tagged with your ID,Which, while you can, I ask you to repeat to me."This will relax you," I say as needle enters vein.To a door between sleep and death I hold the key.Those words you'll keep. What you hear and seeNext will disappear like water down a drain.Stripped to a cotton gown and tagged with your ID.That's what we want, to deaden all your facultyOf knowing—isolate the body from the brain.To a door between sleep and death I hold the key.But the threshold's narrow, and inadvertentlySometimes a paralyzed awareness will remain,Stripped to a cotton gown and tagged with your ID.From far away you witness the body's agony,Spared from sharing it, released from sense's chain.To a door between sleep and death I offer you the key,Stripped to a cotton gown and tagged with your ID.