And now the body is so bruised and punctured 
and the flesh is ragged from all the ports and 
lines into veins and transplants and biopsies 
that it becomes necessary to prop or lean 
it against any available surface or table edge,
against countertops and cabinet doors, just to
keep it upright, and now we find it is 
necessary to forgo ownership of the body, so 
that it becomes The Body, not my body, 
because the connection is damaged and 
distorted completely, and it is a fiction 
to pretend it is mine when it has so clearly 
been handed over to those who process it 
and test it, and it is so clearly an object 
for the equipment to scan and judge and 
calibrate; the x-ray, the CAT scan, the MRI 
need it to work on, they need it more 
completely than anyone else needs it. 
In its present condition, who would want it, 
who would ever consider embracing or 
even touching it, it is so clearly damaged
and not functional. What can be done now, 
how could it move back into the realm 
of the living, or just the tolerable? What,
in its present guise, is it for?