The Exam

The metal footrest numbs my feet
and the backless gown escapes my body.
I sip barium on command:
Turn this way, take a breath
now blow it out–hold it,
don’t breathe.

The table and I fall backward in space.
Images of my stomach, ghostly white,fill the small screen–
grainy like underwater movies
where moray eels dart in and out of their caves. 
Dimly, film plates snap in and out:
Move an inch, take a swallow.
Here. There’s something here. 

Instead of today, I think of tomorrow
and what I’ll wear to Carrie’s wake.
I float through my bedroom–tick through
my funeral clothes, shoes, underthings. On the wall
is my painting of horses running among birches,
night lit only by a thin moon.
With the suddenness of cold clarity, I know
that I’m the shadowed blue horse,
running beside the others, invisible
a ghost horse running.

Poem by J. Langetieg
Photo: Unknown