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Angelee Deodhar

The Guf

My neighbor's wife lies motionless in the intensive care unit. She has been like this for a month . . . she overdosed on a pesticide and some psychotropic drugs.

Her respiration is maintained by a ventilator. She is kept hydrated and catheterized but nothing moves. There is no response to any stimulus. In medical terminology she has 'flat lined' . . . is clinically brain dead. The family hopes for a miracle and refuses to pull the plug to let her go. I wonder where she is now, the woman I knew as a caring wife and mother. What happened the night she decided to end it all?

Is this where her soul waits . . . or is it in Gehenna?

stillness
only the heron's shadow
moves in the stream