Tainted blood

Blood vs Chemicals

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I remember the cold of the morning,

fluorescent lights humming overhead,

like a chorus of indifferent angels.

The nurse arrived, her hands trembling —

not with malice, but fatigue,

And I felt the first ripple of understanding:

they too are human,

fallible, drowning in protocols and rushed minutes.

They prepared the syringe,

and I tensed, my veins bracing for intrusion.

“Just a small injection,” they whispered.

Ah, how many times have I heard this lie?

For what is small to the human eye

can be a storm in the river of my veins.

I recoiled as the needle pierced me,

not sharply, but deliberately,

a tiny betrayal that rippled outward.

I carried the medicine,

its chemicals unfamiliar, foreign,

through arteries and capillaries.

Every cell trembled,

and I spoke in silent protest:

“This is not what I asked for.

This is not what life intended.”

The organs listened.

The heart skipped in anxious solidarity,

The lungs shuddered in alarm,

The liver purred warnings,

and even the nerves that often slept

stretched, quivering, ready to scream.

I tried to communicate with the human inside me,

But they did not hear my voice.

They could not hear my rage,

my fear, my exhaustion.

And yet, I flowed,

because that is what I do:

I move where I must,

I carry life, even when life does not see me.

Time blurred.

Hours passed like droplets in a river,

and mistakes multiplied.

The saline dripped too fast,

The drug is too potent,

the temperature too cold.

I felt each misstep like a knife sliding through my crimson corridors.

I screamed,

Though my scream was a whisper,

lost in the machinery,

the beeping monitors,

the footsteps of those who could not perceive me.

But still, I endured.

I carried the oxygen that the lungs struggled to inhale,

I held the warmth the fever threatened to steal,

I bore the nutrients that the body’s trembling digestive system failed to deliver.

I was the unsung hero of suffering,

a crimson sentinel against the encroaching shadow of error.

And then, something miraculous happened.

A young doctor paused,

a hand steady for the first time that day.

They looked at the monitors,

at the charts,

and for the first time, really saw.

I felt their recognition as a current of warmth ripple through me.

Ah! Finally!

Someone acknowledged my pain,

my voice rising in veins, in marrow, in capillaries,

And they acted.

The medicine was adjusted,

the drip slowed,

and the dosage corrected.

I pulsed with cautious relief,

the organs sighing in harmony with me.

I whispered thanks to the heart,

to the lungs, to the fragile, trembling cells.

I was still in danger,

still battered by negligence,

but I was seen.

And being seen is the first step toward salvation.

The hours stretched,

long and unkind,

And I felt the slow erosion of my essence.

Some cells gave way,

some veins bruised,

Some pulses faltered.

I cried, not in anger, but in grief,

my lament rising in waves through the hollow bones,

through the sinews, the muscles, the fragile, trembling organs.

Yet amidst the sorrow, a glimmer appeared.

The patient’s body, battered but alive,

fought alongside me.

Every breath taken was a small victory,

Every heartbeat is a defiance.

I carried hope in each droplet,

a message etched in crimson:

“Though we suffer, though we tremble, we endure.

Though negligence wounds, life persists.”

I spoke to the liver, guardian of toxins,

and it replied with a low hum of resilience.

I whispered to the kidneys, filtering the mistakes,

and they shivered, but endured.

I conversed with the marrow, deep in bones,

and it pulsed back with ancient knowledge:

“Life is stronger than error.

Even when blood dies, it leaves a song.”

And now, in these final hours,

I feel the shadow creeping,

the slow, inevitable ebb.

I taste the metallic tang of endings,

the coppery bitterness of surrender.

I cry for the mistakes, for the negligence,

for the hands that faltered,

and for the life that trembled on the edge.

But I also cry for hope.

For even as I thin, even as I fade,

My essence carries lessons.

The body learns to listen,

the doctors learn to care,

and the memory of my lament flows outward,

into the veins of others,

into the lessons of the world.

I die, yes.

But not in silence.

My last pulse is a song,

My last vein is a river of memory.

I speak to the future,

to the hands that will heal,

to the patients who will suffer,

to the blood that will rise again.

“Remember us,” I whisper.

“Remember the crimson rivers that bore life.

Remember the pain, the negligence, the suffering.

Learn, and be better.

For we are the voice of life itself,

and even in death, we endure.”

And as I fade, a warmth spreads.

The body continues, heart beating, lungs inhaling,

organs whispering in relief,

and I feel the smallest flicker of eternity:

Though I am gone, I am not lost.

I am memory,

I am hopeful,

I am the enduring song of blood.

The room falls silent.

The monitors beep steadily,

The machines hum,

And life continues.

And somewhere, deep in the crimson veins,

my spirit whispers still:

“Though blood dies, life remembers.

Though negligence wounds, hope prevails.”