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Bed Number 3: A Poem by Lalita Vaitheeswaran

In the series of beds in the intensive care
Where tubes and gadgets beeping glare
Breathing from machines and artificially fed
Lying down in discomfort, in a room of dread
There used be this lucky bed number three
Which would supposedly get inmates disease free
Everyone who got that bed by fortune of kinds
Was already jubilant and celebrating in their minds
No one could decipher the role of the unknown
But could not but believe as was being clearly shown
Today in the unit came an accident victim,
Whose chances of living were too meek and grim
His kith and kin beseeched for bed number three
They had heard the rumors, and wept with their plea
Even after days of meticulous treatment and care
He could not be saved from the evil death’s snare
From that day on every empty bed sinister seems
Lonely, scary, ominous vibrations it deems