[Brian Bryan]

3. You are awoken at 3 a.m. by a blindingly bright, enormous light outside your window.




I rose in a panic, still barely awake,
not knowing what happened or where I was laid.
A glaring, evasive, light from above
stared on my face as I tried not to look.
Once my eyes had adjusted, more came into view,
ghastly appliances hung from every face of the room.
An arrangement of tubes act as a lynchpin
constraining my movement to a matter of inches.
I panicked and flinched as something approached
- my hands and my fingers were covered up though!
Shutting them both, I averted my eyes,
just at the moment they first had arrived.
They lurched me from right to left as I swayed,
squirmed and I cried until red in the face.
My head was then cradled, their hold was released,
as they swept up their baby
I took a moment to breath.

The incubators lights glow as we leave.