She Predicts the Verdict of her Lawsuit

-- inspired by Brian Dettmer's sculpture titled "Skull"
(made from audio cassette tape shells)


Where skin sags and eyelids droop, tendons twitch
to Woman in Black. Liquid polymer lines,

coats epidermis, clings atop tissue, throbs.
Don't Let Go, Don't Let Go echoes, as her skull

grows heavy, veins fill with polypropylene.
Sensing her body stiffen, she pictures injection

system, not IV drip. The environment smells acrid,
like diesel fuel. When beyond the din of internal

notes, a commanding voice calls for another tray.
"There're more cassettes in recycling bin!"

She panics, as Eagles -- Greatest Hits Volume 2
reverberate. Had she been prepped for the wrong

operating room? Had the surgeon confused her case
for experimental one? Newly plasticized, she rises

from surgical table humming Foreigner's 1981 song,
I'm Gonna Win.