doctor poems – Pulse

Microcalcifications

Carol Scott-Conner October 1, 2021 4 Comments

A cluster, I say,
so small – see? I can cover it
with the tip of my finger. Tiny little
calcifications. I show
you the mammogram.

My Daughter Paints in Quarantine

Wynne Morrison July 30, 2021 10 Comments

She’s as tall as the easel now,
purple tank top
underneath the apron
falling below her shorts,

My grandmother’s bed bounced high
But I lost the pillow in my hands
Four stitches in the small town
green tiled emergency room
where peering intently into the mirrored light
I was mad because I couldn’t see

This Is How You Cope With Cancer

Justine Parker January 22, 2021 10 Comments

Bleach your hair,

get drunk on champagne,

pretend the left and right halves of your face are the exact same,

ignore and deny it, laugh loudly–too loudly,

Flashback

Rachel Mallalieu November 20, 2020 10 Comments

I notice the name on the waiting room
tab; it’s not a remarkable name,
but one I remember
from elementary school

Things My Wife Left in the ICU

Paul Rousseau September 18, 2020 26 Comments

A pacemaker and defibrillator

Sheets pressed hard with suffering

Seven fingers and one arm, gangrenous dead

Unknown liters of blood

Failed kidneys

Decision

Greg Mahr August 28, 2020 13 Comments

B546 wants to die
eight years after they saved her.
Cervical-cord injuries are cruel.
For Maria it was a gunshot,
but it could have been a car wreck, a fall,
or a drunken misstep off a roof.
The reasons seemed to matter; now they don’t.
Thirty-two, alone, paralyzed, on a vent,
she mouths “no” to the antibiotics, the heart meds.
“I want to die,” she shouts

Back Pain

William Toms June 5, 2020 3 Comments

A 77-year-old woman presents with back pain.
No trauma. No radiation. No red flags.
ROS* otherwise surprisingly negative.
Her exam is unremarkable, actually pretty darn good.
FROM, negative SLR, full distal strength, sensation and DTRs.*

After the usual cautions I reassure her,
prescribe activity, no meds and the tincture of time.
She is fine with that, appreciative and pleasant.
Then she says, “Should I

A Short Explanation of Everything

Daniel Becker May 15, 2020 1 Comment

Our patient says she’s burning up, burning up.
We sponge her off. This student is learning how blood boils,
how shaking chills and drenching sweats punctuate fever,

how water moves in and out of cells
along concentration gradients, how nerves talk,
how some circuits turn all the lights on and all the lights off,

how hearts beat one cell at a time while squeezing together
and in sequence, how the

On the Grounds of a Former State Mental Hospital

Tabor Flickinger April 24, 2020 2 Comments

Through wounds in whitewash, brick edges crumble
To red dust. Weeds pierce the interstices of paths slowly
Giving themselves up to trackless overgrowth

Are all shapes broken that differ from expected forms
Or is this slant just as proper to a cupola as symmetry?
Not if it lets the rain in, I suppose

Whatever Else

Jack Coulehan April 3, 2020 6 Comments

Of course, I wanted to save you
from all this–from machines
and plastic tubes, from the shooters
with their dyes, from the guys
who scan your organs
for the truth, from waits in cold rooms
whose lights illuminate your life
and make it…nothing. I respected
the darkness in you–your son
dead in a senseless crash, the stroke
itself, your husband’s absence.

Sounds

William Toms March 13, 2020 2 Comments

Sound comes crawling through, leaping
from its suitcase of slightly sweaty skin
across to the diaphragm, a divide keeping
him from me, now breached, the world now open
crawling up a well-used black rubber tunnel
to my ears, calling to me, waiting to begin
knowing, albeit briefly, the mysteries within.

Slow, deep whoosh, slow, deep rumble,
in, out, in, out, in, out, the rhythm of breath,
repetition,

Tag: doctor poems