As a child, I liked playing the patient.
It felt good to be touched,
examined, puzzled over, those eyebrows
coming together over my

underlying condition. As an adult,
I liked playing the doctor, saying
to take off this, take off that, getting
to the bottom of it. Getting inside of it.

And now that I’m dying, which is taking
much longer than playing doctor ever did,
and the doctor looks young enough to be
playing doctor, holding the stethoscope

to my skin, saying to take a few
deep breaths—I’m still playing along, pretending
that the doctor can cure me,
which we both know the doctor can’t,

and pretending we’ll switch soon, so I can
slip my hand under the doctor’s shirt
and touch the doctor’s skin, which
we both know I can’t. But here’s what

the doctor doesn’t know: playing doctor
with the doctor somehow makes me feel more alive,
especially now that I’m dying, now that it’s all
so serious and no one is playing. You can

breathe normal now, says the doc. So I eyeball
the silver stethoscope, the iconic white coat,
the clipboard on which I will write
something beautiful and true and life-saving,
if my turn ever comes.