From 'the Double''' Poem by Morgan Michaels

From 'the Double'''



Miggi thought the hospital right for Geronimo. There he could be watched. The hospital in Havana was a good hospital.Geronimo would go to the hospital in Havana.

'We're calling you an ambulance, man', he explained. 'You're better off'.

While speaking, he took in the privations of the room. Everywhere disorder of the superficial type'. Whatever his merit as a small town celebrity, Geronimo's well-being couldn't be left up to neighbors. What's more, he thought, 'he needed a housekeeper'.

At the sound of the word 'hospital' Geronimo's face darkened.

'Stay there. Don't move', said Miggi, spotting a telephone on the nightstand by the bed. Crossing the room, he picked up the mouthpiece and dialed so hard his finger jammed. He started again. After several rings the operator answered. He gave directions to the house and a brief account. The operator promised to send an ambulance and he hung up the phone.

Turning to Geronimo, again, he said,

'Let's get your things together, Senor, the ambulance is coming'.

'Si, intiendo', croaked Geronimo in a misshapen voice that sounded like an arrow going awry.

But he was unhappy and gave out a sound between a howl and a growl, because he didn't want to go. People who went to the hospital died, in his experience. Countless times he'd seen it, starting with a couple of his kids and later on, his wife. Each entered the hospital sick but alive and finished dead.The outcome was reliable. The hospital was to be avoided. Whatever happened in there it seemed to furnish the 'golpe' that sent people on. He was resigned to the idea of death, the lot of all born. But like his parents and their forbears, he wanted to die sensibly at home amid familiar faces and things, and, then, pretty quickly. The hospital was a lie, as far as he knew. If what he'd been told as a child was true, he could expect good things from death, because he felt he'd led a responsible life and he would see people he knew. It was undignified, the hospital. Poor in all but dignity, he was. In dignity, he was rich.

'Wait, gasped Geronimo, 'there is something I must ask you. Something I must tell you'.

Miggi didn't want to hear because...

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