Poetry from The Literary Review



O Negative

MARY MacGOWAN

Blood and guts don't bother me. When Rachel's finger was sliced open,
it was me, holding it to stop the blood, saying this is going to need stitches.
It was me, pressing an ice pack on Julie's arm, knowing it was broken.
Hey, I'm the one happily watching the needle sink in, type O Negative.

There are so many other ways I'm certain I could be brave.
I could discover the body of a murder victim and not retch. I believe
I'd even lean in to get a closer look. I'd notice how the legs are splayed,
how blood has stuck in the hair, whether the eyes are open or closed.

I could be a nurse, too. I'd bring the cool metal tools to the surgeon,
sponge up the oozing blood. I'd inhale the rare sweetness of time
in the operating room, everything measured so precisely, so well-contained:
beats of the heart, anesthetics, sponges, stitches, the miracle of oxygen.

I could even operate on you if I needed to. I could stick the scalpel deep
into your chest, pull back the skin, cut open the row of rib bones. I could reach
in and pull out your heart, I could do this and not faint. I could sew up any hole
your heart may have, I'd work the needle and thread until it was as neat
as a queer needlepoint. I'm not bragging. This is just something I know.

I've always been cool and calm when fingers come unbuttoned.
But I must confess that if I held your thumping heart, I might feel something more,
like I'd have to fight the urge to shake it, or maybe yell at it. I'd hold its baboom
baboom up to my ear, and then I might just put it back in your chest upside down.

I wish someone could tell me the right thing to do, or how I should feel.
When I think about my own heart's squirrel running so fast on its lonely treadmill,
I just want to sit down and cry. O I know I should stop being so negative.
Besides, I should be used to it, I'm a universal donor. Everyone wants my blood.