Louie Skipper: The Night Nurse

Why are Hieronymus Bosch and Salvador Dali

still not speaking

after passing through the Crab Nebula together?

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Was it necessary

for Shakespeare to become anonymous

before being made immortal?

.

Overcome as I was with pneumonia,

what fear from me did the night nurse take on,

watching over me hour by hour,

through the oxygen tent urging me to breathe,

to live by her touch?

What lack of mercy and allegiance did she live into

when I was on my feet again

that led her to take her own life alone and far away?

Copyright 2018 Louie Skipper. From The Work Ethic of the Common Fly (Settlement House, 2018).

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Louie Skipper is an Episcopal priest and college chaplain to Montgomery Episcopal Campus Ministries in Montgomery, Alabama. He has published three books of poetry.