Sickbed

Rainer Maria

my eyes are becoming yellow curtains.

paint the window,

stain the ceiling feverish green.

my visitors smoked cigarettes

and ate all the things that had me feeling unwell.

everything that came out of me

was wrong-colored,

or wasn't at all.



the voices below rise through the window,

failing to make me well.

knocking on the door from the inside,

taking pictures of my room one last time.

i can't live, without.