Stillness, Come Sit With Me
I wish in these hours of tendon, bone, salt
Shared History
I say, “What seems to be the problem?” You say, “I don’t know. You called me in.” I say, “Are you getting enough exercise?” You say, “I’m too tired after a day on my feet. My muscles ache from the up-down-up-down-up-down.” I say, “Are you taking your fluoxetine as recommended?” You say, “The little half-moons? …
What’s in Your Hands?
What was in your hands when you arrived at the Emergency Department? Your belongings that you wanted to make sure got to your hospital room 3 days later? Your chest as we discover fluid around your heart In the ICU? Your husband’s wrist as your heart speeds up past normal levels In pre-op? Your neck …
6AM/PM
What have we to show? Walking home Under the empty Orange light of sodium street lamps After even the stars have gone to bed And the sidewalk slush soaks scrub hems. Too tired to stuff speakers into our ears As to avoid being left alone With the siren-silence And our thoughts. Fresh footfalls indent the …
Bayanihan
There’s a Filipino word: bayanihan (buy-uh-nee-hun) which roughly translates to a spirit of helping your community without expecting anything in return. Bayanihan: also the word used to describe the tradition of neighbors coming together to move a family’s nipa hut from one place to another. In this way, life is carried on the shoulders of …
Salt Lake
The Elijahs who parted the waters with the rod are gone And we remain The chariot of fire and the whirlwind The woven mantle and the staff with which to split the sea Fall to us The coal fire and the dam dynamo whirling in the spray The white coat and the uranium control rod …
Til Death Did Us Part
There were no last breaths to take You couldn’t Just beats of your heart I promised you wouldn’t be alone I promised the kids You weren’t By your side I lay You were at peace No longer suffering No hunger for air Just you and I As the saying goes Love someone enough to set …
Stage Four
She is stage four. Knowing this will take her life, Someday. Her daughter knows too, but no one else can see the tiny cluster of cells on her liver; in her brain. When they hear she has cancer they think it must be early because she still has her hair. They don’t realize it’s a …
Sometimes the Shape of Grief is a Stethoscope
There is a certain bittersweetness in the place That marks my journey to physicianship. The place where my mind blossoms And my heart will always ache. It is here, in the hospital, Where I am both the eager learner And the bereaved family member. The bright-eyed student, The twin-less twin. As I walk down the …
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after wards
Rooms where there is living and dying Giving and drying Eyes, diagnoses either millstones or balloons On frail necks. In these touchstone rooms we make our house, And forsake our spouse At home, that home. Our promises are full of “soons”, Our ears, “Next?” In their beds our guests slumber evades Cacoph’ny in spades Sings …
What is Love?
Is it a gentle kiss? Is it a whispered promise? Is it a summer day’s bliss? Is it relinquishing your freedom to be with them? I saw it there, in a memory care unit He was the only person she knew He still understood time, place, and her heart But couldn’t bear to part from …
Romance and Medicine
“We need to talk” The attending said that before berating me “You’re never home” Reminder to send a referral to that nursing home “You’ve been so distant” My patient can’t travel from their rural home for treatment “I need more” My oncology patient begging for more time “Don’t you remember how it used to be?” …
One Poke Away
I knock and introduce myself: — I’m here to draw your labs. — Count Dracula, come in, but say, How painful are your stabs? I tell him with a cheerful smile: — Most patients don’t complain, I do this everyday and so, Know how to find a vein. Big eyes stare up at me, Suspicion …
Opening the Door
It’s my first day working on the COVID ICU I have so many fears We know nothing about this disease I don my PAPR and do the safety checks I don’t believe in God, but I pray I will be safe I enter the anteroom, take a deep breath And open the door to the …
the plastibell
a pitcher plant luring its prey,
Elemental
Fire
Elegy-Gratitude to the Anonymous
It is apparent that it is time to transition
Blindspotting: The Father and The Imam
The term in the title?
Colophon
I am not a god who can stare into your soul I am not a priest in a wood confessional my job is to help and I’ll be here by your side try to understand as I pry out points you hide still your life is yours with your friends and loves to quote I …
The Last Lullaby
How are you doing, Mentally, Caring for COVID patients? The response in my head, A letter, Never read: Mr. L, I didn’t want to learn the dosages of Ivermectin Outside of intended use. Your telehealth provider makes me see red. Your ventilator amplified The Last Lullaby. You loved many. They watch over you. Extubated. Cold.
Ode to Outpatient Shadowing at the Children’s Hospital
After Kevin Young Praise to animals doodled on intake forms Praise to the rattle of pretzels in Tupperware Praise to stools that spin And to the children that spin them And to walls for launching from Praise to headbands with red bows Civilizing the snarl of unbrushed hair Praise to green trucks that wind up …
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Glimmer
The desert sun does not shine faintly Its light unwavers at the first glimmer of the dawn No dim perception A simple twinkle becomes a sparkle and then a shimmer No feeble nor intermittent glow Its brightness not subdued at break of day Its luster—steady, brazen as it meets the moon Today recalled this shine—a …
I am sorry, honey
I had run the hill past the Montessori school hundreds of times But now I couldn’t, breathless. Then, blood in my eye, in my nose. An exquisite April day Under a flowering tree in the park I told my husband they saw blasts in my blood. Leukemia. A turn in the course of our lives. …
In the waiting room
A person who knows no roof But intimately knows his green tarp A person who lost his friend To the cold last week A person who gives bear hugs And likes to read A person who has not had the chance To wash his jacket since It was fished out of the donation bin This …
To Crochet
I can’t pretend to understand What it is to make something Out of nothing but chaos and string To use nothing but my hand And perhaps a tool or two To make a hat that would fit a king And on brisk slicing sidewalks That turn quickly to slide-walks I wonder how long it would …
