Danger Men at Work

[milo]

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(Todd, tectak)

I ran in slow motion past
the empty ambulance

Why the break on "past"?
I think "empty" is superfluous.

into a room full of unanswered prayers

There is probably no way to convince you that "room full of unanswered prayers" is a "dim land of peace" situation but I think you could at least shave "full"

clinging to the thick burgundy
carpet, bibles, and tissue boxes.

why the break on "burgundy"?

In the hallway, I could hear
a woman's high pitched laughter.
Her relief blistered my skin.

the last line here is too hyperbolic. Something else that is odd here as well, but it is tough to put my finger on. I suppose laughter and relief aren't properly tied together. It also feels too much like flat prose. Many of these word choices should be pointing toward your metaphor but hey are not so they should probably be re-thought: burgundy, hallway, high pitched (high-pitched btw), they are flat description.

I would have waited for you

again, i am perplexed by the break on "you"

indefinitely in that sterile room,

when did you get to a sterile room? I assume we are in a different room (no carpets in sterile rooms) but we need some kind of transition for you to use "that"

but a doctor arrived to assault me
with practiced sympathy.

"assault" tells too much.

Your shrouded body
hiding a gaping hole

is the body hiding the hole or the shroud? You wrote it as if the body was hiding the hole. Also, "gaping hole" is cliche.

the surgeon made trying
to massage your heart back to life.

is he trying to massage the heart back to life or the person?

No sheet could conceal
the dark void in my chest

the way this is written is that someone would try to conceal a void in your chest but we can see it anyway. It just feels like inaccurate reportage to me.

as I touched soft brown hair streaked with silver
and memorized the love lines around your eyes.
"Goodbye" I said to the second father
that left me in this lifetime.

as a reader, i never get the significance of the "second" father turn. How does this relate to the rest of the poem? It feels like a detail stuck in because it is a true story but it ends up weakening the poem as a whole.

Thanks for posting.