at the rear of the hospital waiting room
stands a trio of vending machines
and each one’s equipped
with a credit card reader
that’s pretty convenient i guess

so the one on the left offered pepsi
(i mean diet of course)
so I swiped

and the vending machine called its captain
who decided my credit was good
and it gave me a bottle of zero-cal pop
which was roughly as warm
as some freshly-made pee

as i looked at my bottle
of summery soda
i thought of my poor wife’s
abdominal pain

(which was sudden
and awful
and why we were there)

and i said
this is nothing
this urine-like beverage
it’s not a thing
i should be bothered about

and besides
i could see
that machine number three

had coke zero