Serving Coffee in the ICU

My supervisor said not to, my first day,
her face closing off the words
as if she were pulling a curtain around a bed.
Families would come to demand it, and
I was there to clean the room.

But the woman huddled in the recliner
clutching an e-reader
tears shining silver on her cheeks
accepted it graciously,
cradling the styrofoam cup like fine china.

Her eyes pooling depths of despair,
she mustered a smile to thank me.
Not just for the coffee, she said.
For your kindness.

Pushing my cart toward the door
I could read one word upside down:
Hope.

*

Madeleine French lives in Florida and Virginia with her husband. A Best of the Net nominee, her work appears in Dust Poetry Magazine, West Trade Review, Schuylkill Valley Journal, Door Is A Jar, San Antonio Review, and elsewhere. She is working on a full-length poetry collection.