GETTING THE EKG by Andrea Potos

GETTING THE EKG

Electrodes seem suctioned
to my skin while my stockinged feet
peek out from the thin blanket.
I chat with nurses Darva and Mackenzie,
notice a tone in my voice
I didn’t know was mine. I can hear
my mother speaking, her small giggling,
gentle conversation while sitting
each week in Infusion Bay, and later,
waiting for another test to see
if the cancer had spread.

I don’t have cancer, but my chest
has been hurting, a steady ache which,
it turns out today, is nothing drastic.
Muscle strain or stress they say, or maybe
the patient diligence of loss, all that is
past and impending, the sustaining
rhythm that holds it.

*

Andrea Potos is the author of seven full-length poetry collections, most recently Her Joy Becomes from Fernwood Press and Marrow of Summer from Kelsay Books. A new collection from Fernwood entitled Belonging Songs will be published in 2025. New poems are forthcoming in Women Artists’ Datebook 2025, The Healing Muse, Braided Way, Delta Poetry Review, Midwest Quarterly, and the Paterson Literary Review.