a seam with staples

From today's poem at Poetry Daily:

Weird Hotel

When he says the word tumor
I'm noticing the doctor's hip new
minimalist glasses, green titanium
with non-reflective lenses,
which make him look worldly and kind.

I wake up in a weird hotel
tethered to various machines.
Pain is confined to a faraway pasture;
it gazes at me over the fence.
When it leans its huge body
against the spindly rails,
I push a button that shocks it,
and it backs off, but continues
to watch me, waiting for a chance
to come lie down with me
because my body is its one true home.

A seam with staples runs
from navel to pubis, sealing a body
now devoid of female parts. All gone!
Only the common human ones remain.

The dogs come to visit,
but they live with the wolves now,
and keep outside the circle of light
around the bed, in the snow,
their coats burdened,
and will not let me touch them.

I dream I lie in my slippery green
sleeping bag on a hard bunk
at the monastery, vowing
Desires are inexhaustible;
I vow to put an end to them.
And it's true, I have no desires here
among the chirring and chiming machines.

How strange, to have left the world
and returned to it
having taken nothing with me
and bringing nothing back.

Chase Twichell

Provincetown Arts
Annual Issue 2009/10