Delores birthday has passed
She's still there at the care center
Out on Mission Road
Just like she never left it in 1995
How I dream of her consistently
Standing by some medication cart with me
As sleeping brings on nurse dreams
Just like I never left
That one-butt nurses' desk
With 100 and 200 Halls
To my right
Way down there in front of me
300 Hall that Karin worked
400 Hall for bathing clients
For storage rooms
Until Delores had too many babies
Then it became a day care center
My first nursing job from
1988 to 1995
Through many Springs, Summers
Falls and Winters
Mary, Dee, Maryann, and Jett
With others sometimes
In the dark of night shift
With a front door
We locked with a screwdriver
After too many drunks
Tried to fight me
When the Tribal Police
Wouldn't take them all the way
To Mission
They would fall in the gravel
Come back itchin'
For a fight
It was just a part of the
Sometimes graveyard shift flow
At 3AM, when Mission was too far to go
Out there were cassettes of MsO4
I was never afraid
Of some gun-toting-drug fiend
Coming out there to steal it
I wonder if I dream
Of Delores because she
Didn't gave me hugs
Like Cecile would
Or Karin
Or Anita even
Then I wonder
If somehow that place
Was my heaven
With John Anderson
Then Beth
The administrators
Of my years there
Where I wanted to be good
As I should
And I was
Just because
A nurse and mom
Was my whole life then
While it's not anymore
As my kids have grown
I still walk those floors
In my dreams
Doing nurse care
As even in sleep
I do share
Myself with others
While the pain of arthritis
Can be mean
I'm still a nurse there
On the scene
Doing treatments
Procedures
Giving medications
Directing C.N.A.'s
I guess I'll be a nurse
There at Delamarter Care Center
In my dreams
For all my days.
