Bed

Bed
After Roberto Bolaño
i was injured
had injured my spine
and could hardly walk
practically i was trapped there
in my apartment for months
getting up only
to cook or take a bath
which could sometimes distract me
from the pain
which was constant
and which exhausted me
even when lying down
and i started most days
getting up
as soon as i awoke
eating nothing
besides two Tylenol
with a glass of water
and after that
i returned to my bed
started doing my job
which fortunately
i could do from there
although with great discomfort
i attended meetings
with men who were my bosses
they would ask casually
how i was doing
how my weekend had been
and i was candid
and almost desperate with them
as i explained
how i was feeling
how unsure i was
whether i would
be able to recover
without undergoing
more and ever riskier
surgical procedures
and they had little
to say in response
and i ended my workday
always exhausted
but still wanting
to walk myself to the park
where one day
i hoped to take estrogen
for the first time
thinking maybe i would be
able to make it further
than i had the day before
but each time
at the same point
a block away from my home
i felt a grinding pain
shooting down from my hip
through the nerves in my leg
that buckled me
and i turned back
and i limped home
and returned to my bed
and on other days
i had appointments
with a doctor
in lower Manhattan
he had muscular shoulders
wrapped tight in athletic gear
he spoke quickly
showed little patience
said little in response
to the many questions
that i asked of him
in our short appointments
at the ends of which
he assured me
that i would get better
he didn’t want to see me
have any more surgeries
although he didn't explain
how that would happen
and afterwards each time
i entered a small room
where i lay face down
on the motorized table
that raised me up
into position for him
and i waited as he moved
the motorized needle
into the nerve in my back
and injected the medicine
which always brought on
just as strongly each time
that grinding pain
through the nerves in my leg
and when that was done
not feeling much better
or much different than before
i left in a taxi
and returned to my bed
i would listen to Mozart
the opera Don Giovanni
the very last scene
over and over again
and in my mind i pictured
my back muscles
gradually weakening
as i had sat in my chair
in an office next to
these joyless men every day
and i persuaded myself
that my injury
was one precipitated
by my failure to move
to follow my path
an injury i deserved
i thought of Don Giovanni
his hand in the icy grip
of the slain Commendatore
and bent to his knees
with the orchestra
playing as loudly
as it possibly could
intense and inescapable
and i thought to myself
that i was being punished
not for the commission
of any selfish acts
against other people
but for the failure
of my own will
for my failure to act
for my own sake
and terrified of tomorrow
i lay in my bed
i lay silently
eventually falling asleep
and on other days
i had appointments with
a physical therapist
at a clinic
at which i arrived
wearing athletic shorts
and a t shirt
and looking very much
like a man in every way
besides my long hair
which was unstyled
and not recently washed
i did exercises
as they instructed me to
exercises that had
no satisfaction in them
like the accomplishment
of lifting a heavy weight
but only a dull tension
that i endured until
it was finally over
it reminded me
of bland food
the food that the men
the men who were my bosses
ate at their jobs every day
perhaps believing
that they were like soldiers
and that these were their rations
and when i was done
i left the clinic
and returned to my bed
and one day i remembered
a woman
who had been my lover
and was now my friend
she had gotten sick
had been bedridden
was in bed for a whole year
and then recovered
i wrote to her
asked her what had helped
what helped her get through it?
and she wrote back to me
she said that in AA
she learned about surrender
about letting go
that she had these recordings
people speaking about it
speaking a lot about God
and although God bothered her
the idea bothered her
because she was a scientist
she allowed herself to hear
those parts that were helpful
and used them to recover
and i asked if i could hear
the recordings she had
and she sent them to me
and i lay in my bed
and i listened to them
and in one recording
an alcoholic spoke
sounding friendly and at ease
in front of a crowd
“when i was a boy
i used to go to church
and i felt alone
everyone around me
looked so happy
looked like they belonged
i didn't want to speak
during confession
because i thought
that they could be
gathering evidence
to use against me
and i saw the crucifix
above the pulpit
which was gigantic
and terribly gruesome
it seemed to say to me:
this is what God did
to his only son
the son he loved
imagine what he’s going
to do to you
that was life in my kingdom
the kingdom i made up
where i was in charge
where i was king
and it was mine
but i was miserable
and so lonely
but when i started drinking
every problem was solved
suddenly i belonged
and everybody loved me
and wanted to be my friend
and no matter how badly
i would feel later
it was always worth it
worth it to keep drinking
to belong again
and eventually
it had gotten so bad
that they took me to AA
and the people here helped me
they understood me
and they helped me understand
what i will share with you now
i realized i drank because
not being in God’s kingdom
but in my own
i was lonely for God
and that once i let go
once i put myself
into God’s hands
i was no longer lonely
but was together with God
and i didn’t need to drink
because i knew i belonged
here in God’s kingdom
the one i found in AA
with all of you”
and as i listened to him
to the AA speaker
i knew why it had helped
had helped my friend
the beautiful scientist
decide to keep living
and i started to cry
and although i felt badly
and ashamed i had thought it
i wished that i
could be an alcoholic
and go to a meeting
for people like me
who would understand
and one day i came again
to the physical therapist
and saw a new patient there
i hadn’t seen before
who was a trans woman
dressed in workout clothes
sage green and lavender
looking beautiful and healthy
so much that she didn’t seem
even to belong
in a clinic with us
she joked with other patients
they seemed so drawn to her
and i felt very strongly
that i wanted to talk
to talk with her
though i couldn’t think
of anything to say
except that i was trans
like she was
and that i wanted to feel
i could be like her
in other ways too
and i secretly watched her
while i did exercises
those bland exercises
that were always the same
and in the doing of which
i felt no release
nor any accomplishment
and after a while
when my session was over
i went home
i returned to my bed
and i thought again about
walking myself to the park
where i hoped someday
to begin becoming
a woman
like the one i had seen
at the clinic that day
and i fell asleep
and on another day
after much discomfort
and frustrating meetings
with the men
i felt restless
could no longer concentrate
on my work
i got out of my bed
i walked out of my house
in the usual direction
and after a while
i found that i had walked
for a block or two
past the point at which
i normally had to turn back
i continued through the streets
past apartment buildings
that i hadn’t seen in months
and were now visible
in perfect detail
in vivid color
i walked myself to the park
and across the lawn
and up the hill
with the monument on top
and then back down it
and past it
and out of the park
having no destination
but only knowing
that for now
i would allow myself
to keep walking

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