the hospice worker, the girl at the end of the hall

My pretty bird is so beautiful here in this small place. My pretty bird -- with her drug-store-orange hair and feathery, falling-apart locks -- sits pretty here, sings pretty here, wears breathing tubes like diamonds, paper gowns like silk. In this ammonia-stained castle I can see clearly the shadows delving deeper underneath the wings of her shoulder blades. My pretty bird sleeps pretty on her stiff, bleach-soaked perch, chirps pretty to the stiff, bleach-soaked nurses, drinks pretty through the stiff, bleach-soaked feeding tube. Melodious, picturesque.

I find her busying herself sometimes: paintbrushes, canvases, watercolor. In the end her fingers are just a little too shaky, my pretty bird's mind sure but her body uncooperative, unwilling. In the end her drug-store-orange hair and feathery, falling-apart locks are the most vivid contrasts against the stark monochromatic walls. I find her on the floor when no one else notices; I find myself busying my own mind with her too much when the wings of her shoulder blades hollow out painfully to reach for another hue, when she looks at something that isn't her, wasn't her, couldn't possibly be her when she was only diagnosed just a year ago. My pretty bird sits most of the time. I, with my ornithologist eyes, can only watch.

She greets me with a cheery hello at the delivery of each daily dose of painkillers. We talk sometimes.