Dirty Dyl (Art Therapy)

I.
Dirty Dyl, known for his ostentatious attitude
(typical of a manic persona)
wants to have a rap battle
in the middle
of the TV room.

Dirty Dyl, who lost
phone privileges on his first night
dialing 911:
I’m being held
hostage at South Oaks
Hospital, he said
& then screamed &
shouted & started to cry —

I ask him if poetry will do.

II.
I read my poem in art therapy.

Soon, three other patients are
scribbling in the small hospital-issue
composition notebooks
& the backs of napkins
in pencil, crayon, or markers
(the washable, non-toxic kind)
simply
because
it’s better than passing the time
weakly magnetized by television
game shows.

III.
I know Dirty Dyl,
or at least I know his face
from a gay hookup app.
He with his
crooked swagger &
snapback caps
is Not My Type.

Only I know
he is bisexual. Only I
know that he fucks
people like
me.

Somehow,
maybe
just in Dyl’s mind,
being the keeper of
this secret
inspires
trust.

IV.
Depressives squint at their words
with tired souls,
heavy hands & looks of
consternation. It’s not
beautiful, you know — it’s
bedhead & stubble &
hospital slippers with the little
treads on the bottom —
but as they write, they are
inspired,
their eyes grow bright,

they know of ink
on the page, the spark
of a fire in their
blood & they are increasingly,
if just a little bit,
alive.

V.
Dyl went home before I did.
I saw him the other day.
He got his job back at the dining hall,
where he once came to work on shrooms.
He smiled at
me & asked,
How’s poetry?

I smiled politely
back, thinking of
a line from Whitman

(I too am not
a bit tamed, I too
am untranslatable)