A Wrack of Ribs

 A Wrack of Ribs

Not a rack, the kind you eat, but a wrack - mine, broken.

Six of them cracked in my back when I fell off the back of a truck.

My diagnosis, “rib fractures without significant displacement.”

Well, guess what, there was:

From the truck to the ground,

From whole to in-pieces,

From conscious to unconscious,

From comfort to pain,

From a help to a hindrance,

From sleeping in a bed to doing so in a chair, 

From confidently agile to carefully hesitant,

From active to sedentary for awhile,

From productive as a poet to having the metaphors seemingly knocked out of my head.

My ribs, I think, acted as shock absorbers, taking the brunt of the impact. 

Though I was knocked cold, my wrack of wrecked ribs spared my head serious injury.

Am I wracked and ruined.? No, I’ll be back!