As a nurse practitioner in palliative care, I had the honor of sitting with grieving family members who sit vigil at the bedside of someone in the hospital. This poem attempts to illustrate the strain of waiting day after day for someone to die.   

Cheryl Waitkevich spent 40 years working in healthcare, primarily in palliative care. Now retired, she is enrolled in the MFA program at Pacific Lutheran University. She has been published in West Trestle Review, Galway Review, and Cirque as well as other journals.