“Propofol Served W/Dry Ice And Time” by Dennis Mahagin

The name
of the bully will be
forgotten

who shoved
your head
in the creek will be
evaporated
pleasant

as any
surprise
of tear ducts,
cotton wisps fucked over
by azure, hypothermia,
ether- soaked
mists.

An anesthesiologist
in her green shift
and mask, knows
how minutes drip

hypnagogic
as eyelid spots,
dry ice wisps
cling with slush
on grass bank,
the thing

with bullies they make
you cross yourself, say
“diver down!” hanks
of hair yanked in

ham fist, yet the kind
brown eyes of anesthetists
never speak of this, a smile
knocks a stick of needle

in your wrist. “Yer doing
just great keep counting
back… ninety nine that’s
right ninety eight and
you’ll feel something
cold and wet…” Yet

every bully
genuflects to mist
eventually eyes glazed, fearful
as any smoked glassine, a name
written by jet streams, yet
96 evaporating

silhouettes in
95 venous hiss
like fingerling

sleep
fish
94 in which
you … 93
and he
come

to this.

More poetry at Used Furniture.

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