oh one thing

Posted: November 9th, 2015 | Tags: | No Comments »

from the paris review interview with poet jack gilbert:

I’ve never been in a hospital, except once—I fell. … I was supposed to die. I fell head down from ninety feet. When I didn’t die right away, they let me go home. I insisted because it was Christmas. If I was going to die, I wanted to die under the Christmas tree with Linda. I still didn’t die. But I couldn’t support my own torso because I’d broken my spine and chest. Linda and I wanted to go to Europe, so I had them build something that was like an exoskeleton. After saying goodbye to the doctors, I walked toward the door with Linda and when I got halfway there the doctor in charge said, Oh, one thing. If you feel a little bit of tingling in your fingers, that will mean that the paralysis has started.



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