Springtime: Two Santas in Street Clothes in a Doctor’s Waiting Room

A poem

Photo by Greg Rosenke on Unsplash

Santa One: “Beard—natural. You?”
Santa Two: “Natural.”

Santa One: “The conference in March?”
Santa Two: “Magical.”

Santa One: “Your suit—polyester? And your belt—black leather?”
Santa Two: “Rayon suit, black leather belt.”

A pause in disbelief.

Shifting their bellies, they pull out their IDs. 
“The North Pole,” they both laugh. 

I am the only other one in the chamber 
for the wishful—the waiting room.

“What do you want for Christmas, little lady?”

But they do not ask.

“A new body,” I would say. 

“Megan,” the nurse calls,
and I close my book, The Curious Reader. 

My every step is wince-filled, 
yet it is not I who wonders over their magic,

it is they who wonder the mystery of my step—
my falter across the linoleum floor, 

like a cumbersome carol 
wished to another. 

---

Megan Huwa is a poet and writer in southern California. A rare health condition keeps her and her husband from living near her family’s five-generation farm in Colorado, so her writing reaches for home—both temporal and eternal. A classically-trained pianist, she melds in her writing aurality, rural life, and empathy through those she observes. Her work has been published or is forthcoming in Thimble, The Clayjar Review, Solum Literary Press, Calla Press, Ekstasis, San Antonio Review, The Midwest Quarterly, and elsewhere, and featured on The Habit Podcast and Vita Poetica Podcast. Find her at meganhuwa.com & @meganhuwa.