Bo

Tell me how you are feeling today

I miss my little kitten

We are going to do testing

He sleeps right here with me

This is a typical case, we know what’s wrong

Soft white fur and a little pink nose

It was very tough for us to fit your procedure in today

Yes, he is beautiful

There are high risks

Bo. He loves me

Your lifestyle will change

He’s my little shadow, we are inseparable

We all have to go one day

My daughter will watch him for me

The Impossible Heart

My Mind is sharp enough

to understand I stand at a harbor…

where no ship awaits.

I wait on a platform…

where no train arrives.

I live my life

and my heart is ever unruly.

I will stay grounded…

but I fear my soul

will forever soar

with ideas

of impossible things.

Web of Causation

Spiders are living in the bathtub
Sharecroppers harvesting what they can
Flies mostly judging by the black specks in my otherwise pure white
ceramic tub I don’t use for fear of disrupting the little ecosystem
established in my absence.

It’s a struggle for survival and the spiders are winning.

The lesson here, if my scientific colleagues are right, is that these webs, these delicate structures so perfectly suited for fly farming are good models for how the world of diseases and causes are organized. Webs of causation they’re called, connecting everything to everything, causes to their effects.

But I must confess that the picture seems wrong
And like them I don’t see the spider in the model
He doesn’t have that sort of web.

His lair is a sticky sweet cause of death itself. The perfect end for botched science, for the abomination crying, help me, help me please, as I walk by, oblivious, on my way to the other bathroom and a clean tub.

Foreign Seed

"Foreign Seed" by Joaquin Zetina, 2020. Drawing and Literature.

 

I decided to write a poem about my experience immigrating to this country and my struggle as a foreigner. I portrayed myself as a seed that usually grows in a different part of the world but is now planted here and struggling to become what it is meant to be. I also chose to design an image filled with personal symbolism. All of the symbols are of Maya origin because they briefly occupied my birthplace of Coatzacoalcos, which means “where the snake hides” in Nahuatl. I wanted to combine the Greek Rod of Asclepius, associated with healing and medicine, with the Mayan Tree of Life. The tree sprouts from the K’at, which is my birthday Mayan symbol meaning “seed,” and it represents germination, growth, and expansion of future generations. The seed channels blood from the ground and feeds it to the tree. In the middle of the tree is the Hunab Ku symbol, the Mayan symbol for the “The One God.” It symbolizes my spiritual beliefs, which are at the center of my life. The tree has two branches growing on each side with two jade-adorned dragons, from which blood-filled flowers spring forth to represent the potential signs of production. The adorning of the dragons with jewels symbolizes the offerings, sacrifice, and cost needed for the tree to keep growing. The tree eventually branches out and white fruit is apparent. The snake climbing around the tree represents the Mayan deity “Kukulkan,” the feathered serpent that can live beneath it all and above it all. The snake is covered with Monarch butterfly wing patterns, which represent Dreamers. Out of the mouth of the snake comes out an Ah-men, or Mayan physician, with a stethoscope ready to be used.

This project was unique to me because I was able to artistically express myself both visually and in writing. I felt that it was an opportunity to incorporate my culture and my identity as a medical student. I could expand on each of these symbols, but it is difficult for me to explain situations that I have lived that are unique to me. I feel that others would not understand certain aspects of my life. I would like for people to just appreciate my art and make their own conclusions, which I feel is the purpose of most artists in general. I did not want to display any political ideologies, or to sway people in how they think about a particular subject. Everything included in the poem and the design are my raw experiences. I hope that anyone who sees my art can enjoy it and appreciate it because it truly comes from within.

An Education

/YouÕre Too ADORABLE/
they say/they pat my head
spine tall, eyes clear// I take up space//anyway
But I am Able. To Adore
these
:a baby phoenix with blue eyes
– sits in ash/the charred remains of golden memories –
the untimely/cremation of a childhood/
a mother who//refused//to leave/
the building and tried/to asphyxiate herself/in the smoke/
scorched hands/too frail
/to hold now/
while the/uncaughtunpunished/arsonist/
smiles, languidly tossing/between sweaty palms/the book of matches/
that child/big eyes see nothing/
smiles up
//unknowing//

:the ghost/of a woman
– glioblastoma has stolen her words –
she stares//vacantly//canÕt roll over in bed/canÕt push
we/pull the baby/from her belly/so they can
/pull the tumor/from her brain/and
dadÕs eyes fixate/on this new being/finding pieces of his wife
/the only ones he will be able to keep/
I watch him/watch her die//watch him/watch his life
//end and begin all in one moment//

:the white/white feet
– of a black man –
they dangle off the gurney/his blood/at a standstill
/a bullet/in his chest
we slice him//open//flip his ribs/up and over
a heart in a hand/a walk in a park
a Belmont/a triple lumen/itÕs not big enough
//16:47//

:my own back
– patted from above –
by those with slickglass eyes and teeth/immaculate talons/
/which I must trim/from my own fingers/every day
marble hearts/smiles donÕt touch their eyes/painted goodness
/this i promise/
my face/will crack/
/and I am not saving/I am being saved/
//An education//
in how to feel my own/beat/ing/heart/
/learning to adore/

 

A Story Told in ASL

bacterial meningitis
as an infant
demanded that he spoke with his hands
a sequelae of his genes
rendering his world silent
he lacked the capacity
to form any immunologic memory
so infections were destined
to repeat themselves
“X-linked Agammaglobulinemia”
as it is written in the textbook
“immunocompromised”
as it is written in the news
my goodmornings
were scratched with sharpie on a legal pad.
Monthly
he needs a bag hung from a pole
to deliver what he’s incapable
of producing himself
That is, until he switched jobs
And now his new Insurance told him
he needed to prove
that these bags are truly a necessity
In the meantime
he could go without
said the voice over the phone
Don’t mind the pandemic
they said
translated with quick and articulate gestures
But things go the way they go
as they say
and he turned up in the hospital
with his lungs more cotton than air
his body on fire
Similar to so many bodies burned that year

He could’ve used that bag
We said

Brownian Motion

I often think…
What even is the point
Of all this organization.
Aren’t we all just atoms
In Brownian motion, S
pinning around slamming into each other.

Does our matter matter?

Being a medical student
Is fun,
Is exciting is overwhelming.
Is something that can be too much
Sometimes.
Most times.
Supposedly we will be doctors,
But we just play dress up.

Do we matter?

Doctors try
To control
The uncontrollable.
To comfort
The un-comfortable.
To help people realize their bodies matter.

Will I ever help someone realize they matter?

Cognitive Dissonance

I have to apologize.

I look at you, and I see what could have been. Like a double exposure, I can see another life meld itself over yours. I see familiar eyes dim in confusion; the brows furrowed in agitation. I hear your confabulations – evidence of a once-sharp mind trying to piece together fractured memories – and I hear them spoken in another voice. I feel sad that once-strong hands now tremble, that once-steady legs now barely support your weight, because I knew similar hands and feet.

I’m ashamed to feel that you chose, to a small degree, this result for yourself. I saw so many
similar consequences play out for someone else.

I have to apologize.

You remind me of someone I once knew. Someone I think might have become you, given alternate consequences for choices made. And my heart breaks – for you, and for me. Because I wish I could see them one more time, but instead I am here with you. The thing is, I’m afraid that they may have become you. We would have been like we two are now: me sitting on your hospital bed, and you in your chair as we both try to move forward together into a new normal. I’m sorry if sometimes I look a little too closely, or if I look away a little too quickly. I’m sorry if my smile seems a little sad, or my touch a little uncertain.

It’s just that you remind me of someone I used to know. You remind me of who they might have been.

And I’m so glad they were never you.

The Pacific Pandemic

"The Pacific Pandemic" by Luti Nonu and Telisha Tausinga"The Pacific Pandemic" by Luti Nonu and Telisha Tausinga"The Pacific Pandemic" by Luti Nonu and Telisha Tausinga


Closed Caption

THE PACIFIC PANDEMIC

Luti Nonu and Telisha Tausinga

Though only 1.6% of Utah’s population,
Pacific Islanders have 2x more COVID-19 deaths and
cases per capita than any other racial group.
As of March 1st, 2021 there have been 57 deaths in our
community (utah.gov).

These statistics are bewildering, and we commit to doing
our part to ensure the stories of those whose lives have
been impacted by COVID-19 are heard.

IN REMEMBRANCE OF FIFTY-SEVEN LIVES:

 

Afterglow

I wish I could remember what I know
You stand there with a smile kind and pure
Your nearness seems familiar, almost

You say I used to know you years ago
A friend or foe? Of which I can’t be sure
I wish I could remember what I know

I hope you’re not a friend that I’ve outgrown—
You gently place my two frail hands in yours
Your nearness seems familiar, almost

The mem’ry slowly dawns like morning glow
It is my love— the leaking light ensures
I wish I could remember what I know

I share my heart and try not to let go
But with my tears leave memories endured
Your nearness seems familiar, almost

To know I do not know what I should know
My irony that doesn’t have a cure
I wish I could remember what I know
Your nearness seems familiar, almost

Wizard

Three fingers of your left hand,
it was a simple request.
With three fingers,
the guitar could still sing for me.
For days, your tattooed figure
had laid lifeless in bed
as bacteria sailed in your blood.
Friends told me stories about you,
how you were a father figure
in the homeless community.
Wizard, they called you
after your magical tattoos,
always has a trick up his sleeve.
In another life, you had been to Juilliard,
and now you were working on an album.
You woke up to a skeleton
from five operations on your hand,
cutting out more and more infection.
When the scalpel turned to bone saw,
you asked for a spell to not wake again.

The benefit of the doubt

The  benefit  of  the  doubt  sauntered  into  the  operating   theatre  and
demanded  to  speak  to  the  attending surgeon.   He  gave her  a  blunt
scalpel  and  an  extra sterile towel,  then  hid  under the drapes  for  the
rest  of  the  case. I gave the benefit of  the  doubt  a three-strike  policy.
You  really shouldn’t  be doing  these  things,  I told  him  as  we  shared
hamburgers  on the hospital cafeteria that looks out over the mountains.
He  told me  that  he was going to change, but later that  day  he clotted
someone’s chest tube off.  This is what I’m talking about,  I told him, but
he just shrugged,  then pretended to have  trouble breathing.  It went on
like this for months,  me pleading  with  the benefit of the doubt to  stop
claiming so many lives. He apologized a couple times, and told me he’d
stop hurting people,  but as soon as I’d get comfortable,  he’d sabotage
me  again.   Back  then,   I  think  doubt  still  had  benefits.

Conflicted

Scribbling, humming, tattoo on the corner of her eye

Me, medical student, first year, trying to smile
A couple of questions

She tells me her life

A cycle of abuse, trauma, addiction, uncertainty
What to do, how to change, where to find a guiding light

So much hope and pain and soul
Condensed into something relevant for OB/Gyn
Save the rest for another time, another field
As we cannot help them all.

Typing, jotting down notes, all sounds blur

Me, medical student, first year, trying to close the night
…PMH of…presents with…problem 1…

Sudden sobs jolting me
Family running away, tears in their eyes from
Bad news told worse—their hopes diminish and die

We simmer, stew in the guilt, then shrug
Go forth with our lives
As we cannot help them all.

But why am I here
Me, medical student, first year, trying to survive
Why do I waste away, burn my eyes with the screen lights
Why do I imprint words into my mind
Lock my heart in a box

For an image, a pristine white coat
Two more letters to my two-letter names
If not to
Help them all.

Raison D’Etre

As you read this, trillions of cells are analyzing, acting, and moving in a carefully orchestrated symphony. Each panel provides a glimpse into the individual, microscopic worlds in which these cells work constantly and anonymously to maintain life. Their visual forms provide hints to their unique roles and imagined personalities, all of which contribute to the physiologic success of a single individual: their selfless raison d’etre.

This work is organized in a 6×7 grid of panels, each of which depicts a single type of cell. The panels are arranged according to the approximate relative location that the depicted cell type is found in the body.

Librarian Haiku

A well-crafted search
The terms tingling my brain
Anticipation

Bibliography
Carefully tracked and succinct
For the curious

Have fun with MeSH terms
Milk, Human/adverse events
Mom’s milk can be bad?

28

28 candles flickering.
I close my eyes and make a wish.
I can’t tell you what it is, that would be bad luck.

28 years old, her chart reads.
Triple-negative invasive breast cancer.
What, I wondered, did she wish for?
She can’t tell me, that would be bad luck.

A half-collapsed cake in the corner of the break room.
Sticky plastic knives resting on crumbs and smeared frosting.
A sad pile of sugar trying to sustain the entire third floor of the hospital.
I close my eyes and make a wish for her.
I can’t tell you what it is, that would be bad luck.

What happens to a dream burned out?

What happens to a dream burned out?

Does it flop helpless like a gasping trout?

Does it strike you like an open fist?

Or does it vanish like the morning mist?
–missed, you were missed at her party–
Part, part of me wishes I remembered why
–why don’t you call? We want to know how you’re doing–
Doing, what am I doing, playing at God
–God, you look terrible. Are you ok?–
Ok, one more day, come on, come on.