The Family Waiting Room

Overhead, a fake sky as blue as can be,
made of fiberglass, four large ceiling tiles
as though it will help us here in the waiting room.
Maybe without it things would be worse,
I don’t know.

I have been here more times than I can count.
It is in the basement today 
and my daughter is the focus of worry.
It was her father again and again — and before that, 
my mother, my father.

Lungs, livers and guts: the family’s troubled organs
and to be honest, the fake sky is of no comfort.
Other people waiting, not looking up 
but rather down at their phones hoping for a signal, while the TV, 
blessedly muted,

shows a man wildly waving proclaiming the drama of snow, 
warning of danger and crashes,
while I am here with all these anxious strangers, a community of sorts, 
the people we love, down the hall, 
cut open. 

One by one, like baby birds waiting for the worm, we need news.
Furtive glances, nervous pacing
we are held under a gypsum azure sky
until we get word and permission
to ascend.