Composed 4/11/16
Description: For Day 10 of NaPoWriMo. Based on a conversation I had today.
She was worried she’d die
Face down on the treadmill
Doctors would lick and stick electrodes to her
Watch the beeping of her heart and
She’d begin
Step after step breathing heavy
Up and up and across that digital mile
Sweat beading in her brow
They’d watch her spike
And go flat
What she didn’t remember was
Her heart had experienced more than that mile
She’d known stress of great intensity
Chronic worry and work to the point of fatigue
She cared immensely about every need
Her heart beat along with the
Buzzing in her head and the
Heartbeats of everyone around her
She’d lived a hundred stressful lives
Heart thumping with the emotion of a hundred miles
What she didn’t know was that she’d already passed the test
This was just a formality
Scraps of Paper 