Raindogblue

In the Pool

 

 

The Curl

 

Shadows in Circles

 

 

 

 

Above The Ride

 

 

 

 

Curve

 

 

Liviidity

 

 

"RD!" A new officer calls out to me.

"I got to see my first purple body!"

Had lividity set in?

Yes! The person had been dead a week. 

 

 

When You Decriminalize Drugs

 

A mope called dispatch and complained to me his meth contained Fentanyl. He OD'd and was narcaned back, but swore he real vice is alcohol. 

 

 

Reckoning

 

On a walking beat in the Fentanyl zone,

the Chaplain and are talking to the locals.

A man speaks up, he's no more than 23. 

 

"I've overdosed 16 times.  I want to quit, but I can't."

 

What would it take you to get clean?

 

"That's the thing, it's not just physical addiction.

It's emotional. I don't think I can."

 

 

 

 

Number Two

 

Second overdose of the night, a block east of the first,

a Street Response medic is administering Narcan.

He bags the man. I assist.

 

Soaked in sweat, the man rouses as the ambulance arrives.

He jumps and shouts, "I shit myself?"

 

I ask, You OD'd. Do you want aid?

 

Wild eyed, he shouts, "I shit myself!

" as he runs into the night. 

 

As the local transients clean up the scene,

only the man's outline, made by sweat,

is evaporating from the sidewalk,

remains as evidence of a man nearly dying. 

 

 

 

Authorized Ratio

 

Despite the department hiring 100 officers in the last two years, West Precinct still only has 88 of its 137 authorized officers.