Tomorrow morning when I wake
it’ll be the nurse who’s crazy.
I’ll heave my body up
on its elbows and yell
in her ear, “It’s time for your pill.
Get dressed. Breakfast is ready

in the Day Room. Juice, rolls, bacon, eggs.
You’ll find a tray with your name on it,
faces you know, a chance for conversation.
Eat each meal at a different table.
Mingle. Before you can get out of here,
you have to love all the faces you hate.”

Previously published in The Miscellany: A Davidson Review.

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Donal Mahoney has had poetry and fiction appear in a variety of publications, in print and online, in North America, Europe, Asia and Africa.

Object(s) to bring back to life: “A photo of my father, who fought for the Irish Republican Army back in 1920.”