I struggle in the dark, narrow booth
jabbing my elbows as I remove my shirt
and almost slip off the fold down bench
as I wriggle out of my underpants.
Finally dressed and showered poolside
I patiently wait with two-dozen women,
the only man in the Fibromyalgia/MS group,
for the mothers with toddlers to clear out
of the warm, menthol-blue, soothing water—
my Bethesda—which in Hebrew and Aramaic
means both (dis)grace and mercy,
as was illness in Jesus’ time,
a transgression, a fall from grace.
Bethesda—thought to be a myth
until Schick uncovered the bath
just as written in St. John’s Gospel:
“Beyond the Sheep’s Gate,” a pool
with five porticos where the infirm
sat or lay waiting for the angel
to stir the waters, the first one in, healed.
The pool guard removes the floating chord
that separates the shallows from the deep
and the swimmers rush in as I slowly enter
the only water that doffs the fire
inside my feet, legs, back and groin.
Standing up front, I focus on the instructor,
my movements synchronized with hers,
my earplugs muffling a dozen conversations.
Bethesda, my weekly ritual,
buoyant in the angel’s gift for an hour,
which carries me through
the remainder of each week.
Bryan R. Monte is the editor of Amsterdam Quarterly. His poetry has appeared recently in Kaleidoscope Magazine and the South Florida Poetry Journal, in the anthologies Immigration & Justice For Our Neighbors (Celery City Press, 2017), and Voices from the Fierce Intangible World (SoFloPoJo Press, 2019), and is forthcoming in Beyond a Doubt (New York Quarterly, 2021). He wrote Tiny Zion, (Groningen University, 2015), and his articles have appeared in The International Journal of Mormon Studies and in The John Whitmer Historical Association Journal.
