I'm already going to lose you.

I don't even know your name.

In a world of flashing lights

The sounds of glass and steel breaking free,

For those few minutes, you belonged only to me.

It was I who cut your shirt away

To see your broken ribs

Watching you labour with each breath

As you fought to live.

It was I who wiped the blood away

When it pooled in your eyes,

It was I who watched your heart beat

As the Jaws freed you from your car.

When we finally freed you,

I was still there as we ran

To the back of the ambulance,

It was I who held your hand.

The sounds of the sirens

Rang loudly in my ears

I looked for some small sign,

Your lack of response renewed my fears.

I breathed for you when you could not,

I compressed your chest when your heart wouldn't beat.

I prayed for you with each failure,

I did not want to see defeat.

I finally had to walk away

Knowing the battle had been lost

I saw your father in the hallway,

One look, and I saw the awful cost.

I gathered my equipment together,

And I finally learned your name.

Only 21, I said beneath my breath,

My friends, I feel so drained.

Your blood alcohol came back zero,

The driver of the other car did not.

He was alive and breathing,

No witness to the battle we fought.

I don't know how to say good-bye

We never really said hello,

But a piece of you is with me

Everywhere I go.

When God Made Paramedics

When the Lord made Paramedics, he was into his sixth day of overtime when an angel appeared and said, "You're doing a lot of fiddling around on this one." And the Lord said, "Have you read the specs on this order? A paramedic has to be able to carry an injured person up a wet, grassy hill in the dark, dodge stray bullets to reach a dying child unarmed, enter homes the health inspector wouldn't touch, and not wrinkle his uniform." "He has to be able to lift 3 times his own weight, crawl into wrecked cars with barely enough room to move, and console a grieving mother as he is doing CPR on a baby he knows will never breathe again." "He has to be in top mental condition at all times, running on no sleep, black coffee and half eaten meals. And he has to have six pairs of hands." The angel shook her head slowly and said, "Six pairs of hands...no way." "It's not the hands that are causing me problems," said the Lord, "It's the three pairs of eyes a medic has to have." "That's on the standard model?" asked the angel. The Lord nodded. "One pair that sees open sores as he's drawing blood and asks the patient if they may be HIV positive," (When he already knows and wishes he'd taken that accounting job.) "Another pair here in the side of his head for his partners' safety. And another pair of eyes here in front that can look reassuringly at a bleeding victim and say, "You'll be all right ma'am" when he knows it isn't so." "Lord,” said the angel, touching his sleeve, "rest and work on this tomorrow." "I can't,” said the Lord, "I already have a model that can talk a 250 pound drunk out from behind a steering wheel without incident and feed a family of five on a private service paycheck." The angel circled the model of the paramedic very slowly, "Can it think?" she asked. "You bet," said the Lord. "It can tell you the symptoms of 100 illnesses; recite drug calculations in it's sleep; intubate, defibrillate, medicate, and continue CPR nonstop over terrain that any doctor would fear...and still it keeps it's sense of humor. This medic also has phenomenal personal control. He can deal with a multi-victim trauma, coax a frightened elderly person to unlock their door, comfort a murder victim's family, and then read in the daily paper how paramedics were unable to locate a house quickly enough, allowing the person to die. A house, which had no street sign, no house numbers, no phone to call back." Finally, the angel bent over and ran her finger across the cheek of the paramedic. "There's a leak," she pronounced. "I told you that you were trying to put too much into this model." "That's not a leak," said the Lord, "It's a tear." "What's the tear for?" asked the angel. "It's for bottled-up emotions, for patients they've tried in vain to save, for commitment to that hope that they will make a difference in a person's chance to survive, for life." "You're a genius," said the angel. The Lord looked somber. "I didn't put it there," He said.