A Surgical Procedure Poem by jan oskar hansen

The surgeon has been to my hospital bed, explaining
the procedure, a small elegant man with quick hand
movements and a shock of wavy hair; yet none of
the nurses surrounding him looked impressed, perhaps
they knew something I didn’t, a thought that gave me
a perverse delight. Perhaps he wore a wig too?

I was reading poetry, when they gave me a blue pill,
continued to read, but when I awoke twelve hours had
gone, the surgeon, in his Armani suit, looked down,
smiled satisfied and left. I hated him. It worried me
that the hours away had been dreamless and had I not
awoken I would not know I ever lived.

Faces from the hall of un-famous people, so modest
they had only appeared briefly in their death notices,
arose; made it clear there is no heaven, it’s childish
illusion best done away with; except for my old dog,
she follows me around, even in old dreams dreamt
before she was born. Her brown eyes, beg me not
to leave without her; together and unafraid we shall
walk into the borderless land of nonexistence