Broken Record

A crowd of fearful, anxious bodies collect

In front of the security guarding the elevators

Border control on the ground floor of Fortis Hospital, New Delhi, India

“Visitor hours are only from 9 – 11”

“Only two at a time”

“You have to have a pass”

Stern faces in uniform

Do they have hearts under those badges?

Surely, there is a way to tell a mother

Desperate to see her child

That isn’t so cold, so robotic

I slip by with sympathy and guilt

A recycled visitor  pass stickered on my chest

To see my great-aunt, admitted for the third time

in the last three months for shortness of breath

On the second floor, we exit the elevator

Pass through white walls to enter a tiny rectangle of a room

A frail body in good spirits lies on the bed

Two translucent tubes – lifelines – enter each nostril

I wonder what it feels like to not be able to breathe on your own

I recall the last fourteen days of my winter break

Landing in Delhi Airport

Waking up Kolkata

Driving through Chandigarh

Breathing feeling more like a task

Than a passive yet life-giving process

A record rolling in the background

Going round and round on its own

Filling the room with music

Subtle and soothing at once

I recall the unmistakable film of soot with each inhale

Walking around with scarves as makeshift masks

The misconvenience of not being able to enjoy a nice brisk walk

Let alone the runs that had become my rituals over the last few years

Waiting til we got up north enough

To escape the state of air that has enveloped most states of India

Finding its way inside my great aunts lungs and the lungs of so many

who did not win the lottery to see a doctor

Insidiously working its way through her tissue

Seeping through her skin

Over the years

Her past medical history reads;

“interstitial lung disease of 11 years”

No history of smoking.

At the “top hospital in India” which provides “world class health care services”