This could be an Agatha Christie novel

Three men, two lungs, one liver, countless bottles

Not enough drugs

Just hospital discharge summaries and sad phone calls from families

There’s no instrumental music that could put my heart at ease

Pulseless is the theme, the tune

What is a doctor or a lowly nurse to do?

Death just before Christmas is a mystery

A wife and two daughters are left behind

I see myself in them and wonder when is my time

For that fatal phone call or a walk down that white sterilized hall

The chairs where they sat are empty

As a kid, I thought Christmas was about having plenty

Where does exhausted flesh go

Does the spirit turn to snow

Pneumonia, liver cancer, cirrhosis

Three people aren’t here for Christmas

Does the world notice?

Does Christmas ever outgrow ya?

I still wonder

My heart and my hopes are dashed asunder

Is is psychosis to put my hope in a baby in a manger

Or to hope for an afterlife for these quasi-strangers?

It’s too deep a mystery

To understand death, to understand grief

The bacteria and the dividing cells, the addiction never cease

Around the table at Christmas is a broken family

But my eyes still look at the stars

And my heart holds on hard

To an ancient story of a little boy, a prince, a Lion – come to turn the tables

I’ll keep hoping for this – despite the adversity – as long as I’m able