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Susanna Rich

You point to the empty doorway—

Give me that box.

    There’s no box. It’s the door.

            Why can’t you give me the box? 
            My clothes are all over the bed.

    It’s not your clothes. It’s sheets. 

             Put my clothes into the box.

    Sheets belong here.

Your cheeks tighten, hands clutch, unclutch.

            Why can’t you put my clothes away?

You shake your hand at me.

            They gave me this horrible disease.

For 77 minutes, I pull your hands off 
your catheter, comb your hair, listen to 

            Everyone has left me.

Your voice hoarsens into a 78 record
winding down, in this room
that can’t contain you.

Susanna Rich is an Emmy Award nominee, Fulbright Fellow, and Founding Producer of Wild Nights Productions, LLC. She tours her poetry performances ashes, ashes: A Poet Responds to the Holocaust, Television Daddy, and her musical Shakespeare’s *itches—The Women v. Will. Susanna authored five poetry collections, most recently Beware the House and SHOUT! Poetry for Suffrage. Visit her at www.wildnightsproductions.com.