Too Much Sadness being a nurse

Too Much Sadness being a nurse

Sometimes I press the call bell in my mind

just to see if someone would come for me

like I go for them

but the room stays quiet

I hold too many hands that will never hold back

wipe lips that won’t speak again

and sometimes they smile,

which somehow hurts more than tears

I carry names I never said aloud

stories half-told in whispers

lives folding away

while I pretend I’m not breaking

One said, tell my dog I’m sorry I didn’t come home

and I nodded, like I knew the dog

like I could

make anything better

There are shifts that end

but stay with you

like a smell, like blood

under the nails of your thoughts

Some nights, I cry in the car

engine ticking like a tired heart

wondering how many goodbyes

a soul can carry

before it starts to forget

its own name

Then I realise

I do make a difference

to the lost

lonely

sick

wounded

and dying

then I wipe my tears and smile.