Sunday poetry

Daniel, my brother

We sat in the Emergency Room that night,
concerned and puzzled about your health
since all your life you had been sickly.
You nearly choked to death as an 18 month old baby,
until the nurse that lived across the street was summoned over.
She was able to save your life, but somehow lost her own exactly one month later.
And then the time on the road to Abuelita’s house,
you fell asleep in the back of the old station wagon we had.
With the window down, the Carbon Monoxide that leaked
from the muffler had secretly tried to steal you away.
Your six year old limp body that would not awaken nor respond,
as if it was already too late.
The hospital nearby that administered pure and sweet oxygen
And fate decided again it still was not your time.
You survived countless hospital dashes when severe asthma
held you from breathing, from inhaling, from exhaling
And that dreary look of fatigue from fighting, from struggling for every breath.

Now we are at the hospital again searching for that saving grace once more.
Hoping for that miracle cure to somehow save you again,
to free you again, to make you whole again,
like the cat with nine lives who would not die.

~ Rosey Ramos Abuabara


Note: Rosey wrote this poem while waiting with her brother at the hospital to find out if he was HIV-positive. He was. That was over 18 years ago.