Existential Crisis

And as she sat there

And watched her patient,

The low-functioning one

Who could barely crawl or speak

From a botched bone marrow transplant

She wondered what kind of God

Would leave him on the floor

While she watched him flutter

Like a torn-winged butterfly

They paid her to feed until it died.

It was in the midst

Of that dull, December afternoon

In the gray light of winter

When her answer came

Like the faint whiff of Brach’s peppermint

She always kept in her coat pocket.

Nothing in the room changed

Except for a new bright purpose

Shining from within to

Burn away the darkness -

The realization of her simple presence,

In the presence of another

Warmed that silent, speechless place

With the incandescent glow

Of a light behind her eyes.