Beginning Treatment

flowerI went for my first appointment today. I saw Dr. Weiss, who explained things in terms of crime-scenes and neighborhoods and light-houses emitting stay-away signals. My favorite was her description of my “unforgiving, grudge-holding nerves,” determined to exact revenge. The way I deal with them is up to me, she told me, whether I choose to ignore it, minimize it, dwell on it. Which is not that different from the way we deal with any other sort of trauma or pain. These were the words that came to mind as they prepared me for the coming weeks.

The Planning Stage

A red line
gives me two halves I can see
reflected in the overhead.
A machine that knows me in indecipherable code
accepts me into its heart.
I fling up my arms and become motionless.

The mirror is just a mirror in which I am
my body.

The therapist is a man who says he loves this job.
This job of measurement and accuracy and tattooing landing strips into
naked, named skin.
I wince and try to think of it in terms of laugh lines.

Is it boring? I ask.
Am I still a woman? I don’t ask.
He lays a warm sheet over me, reveals, shrouds, reveals,
I feel his breath on my body.
I read his name-tag in the silence.

They validate my parking ticket;
this is the perq for having to walk through
uncertain doors.

Outside there is no rain.


3 thoughts on “Beginning Treatment”

  1. Barbara Casey says:

    Just know that you are in my thoughts.
    Best,
    Barbara

  2. Charles says:

    Ru, you’re a very powerful woman. You never cease to amaze me. I love you.

  3. Mary Akers says:

    Big, huge, ginormous (but gentle) hug, my darling. XOXO

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