With My Son at Urgent Care

A smiling med student with a clipboard
kneels beside our chairs
and asks me to rate
the health of my son--a wild
stallion colt of a boy--
her earnest pen
poised to circle: excellent   good   fair   poor.
My son is seven, and today--his oxygen
not sufficient to buoy his body upright--
I carried him from the car like a snow-suited toddler.
I don't remember what I said when finally
I could speak. Only
how my son's full-moon face
hung on my response.