The Nickel Cradle

A premature infant nursery of a hospital in Chicago on a hot summer evening, tall windows open to a violet dusk, pale green tiled walls, an oval infant bed of high-gloss nickel-plated copper with a rolled rim on a slender tubular stand, inside a white pillow and a folded white blanket, at its side an upright clear glass water tube with a filler funnel and a brass tap, below the tub a black switch box with two plain knobs, a thin red rubber tube from a plain green oxygen cylinder to the head end, a nurse's hand in a white sleeve at the tap.