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Consult
Daniel Becker
Once the tube is out it takes her a minute to turn blue and relax. Another minute to lose her pulse. I learned as a student to feel the difference between the pulse in my fingers and the pulse at the patient’s wrist. Or thought I learned. When you listen for a heart to stop you start to hear heart sounds that might not be there. Like waking up at night thinking you heard something then listening to the dark to be sure, not quite convinced either way. Weak sounds, S1 and S2, valves closing. Slow and slower, regular then irregular, then almost nothing…then who knows? The monitor is off in her room but on at the nursing station. One screen shows every heart in the unit. I don’t want to sign the consult note until the line stays flat. Erratic electrical activity went on for a few minutes is an understatement. She’d be gone for most of the screen then come back for a complex or two then go away again.
Lying in Wait
Rachel Hadas
Lying in bed and waiting for the purple
bruises to fade from my arms,
I remember the grinding pebbles underfoot
when I gave in to the muscular embrace of the ocean.
Now I rest in the wash of what has been accomplished.
A shallow golden river is pouring itself over stones,
over this empty husk, scooped shell of waiting
for transformation. Also transportation:
I need a fresh itinerary now
a dismantled world is being reassembled;
new map of stars I gaze at from the cool
tank of silence where I lie back, bathe,
and wait for the purple to fade.
Observations
1. Mom spends all her time saying thank you.
Casseroles
whole dinners
arrive at the door,
notes
phone calls
assurances of prayer
and being there
if something is needed,
offers to pick up the children
the laundry
tidy the house
run errands.
Pacemaker
Cheryl Lewis
Knotted seams gather scrubbed skin
and titanium plumbs a heart–
guide wires routing an improvised pulse
and tracing an erratic existence.
In the beginning doctors said
genetic mistake, detrimental
mutation, one in 10,000
statistically speaking. God’s will.
At night we wrestle with angels.
Celestial static, incandescent
blue they search our souls
and finger a laboring heart,
heavy like dense lumpy clay
waterlogged and unformed.
She sat on the curb
Tammy Hansen Snell
She sat on the curb in her hospital gown
pretending not to see me coming.
The tube from her hand to the IV pole in the street
lifted the flimsy sleeve of her robe.
Cars went by, and we both watched them
as if we cared what color they were.
The IV pole in the street didn’t matter
unless two cars went by at the same time.
“You can go away and leave me alone,” she said,
knowing my job wouldn’t let me do that.
Inside the Hospital
Kendall Madden
It’s a desert in here–
the way they suck
the air from one
compartment to another.
I’m parched–
forgotten rain,
blanched mollusk
without the sea.
My stiff face
tries to smile
at a wilted patient.
Pink-tongued lilies
once in a while
overcome the disinfectant,
stale sweat,
with hothouse perfume.
She Lives in a Small Cell
Linda Evans
She lives in a small cell
on the Maximum Security Unit
pregnant with her tenth love child
the other nine scattered
like dried leaves in the wind.
Beneath the baggy government-issued jumpsuit
her belly swells and shifts with the weight of life
a heaviness of never hearing first words,
seeing first steps, or kissing cherub cheeks goodnight,
thoughts as chilling to the bone
as the December blizzard outside.
Over the intercom Officer Ryan’s frantic voice,
“She’s in labor!’
Perspectives
Andrea Gordon
She was a rainbows and unicorns girl,
predictable passions at appropriate ages.
Shy smile and just-above-average grades.
Yearly visits by the book, or, in this case,
computer screen prompts.
Milestones noted, talk about diet,
ceremonial exam, note straightness of spine.
All on track, along the mapped out course,
until an extra visit at thirteen.
Mom had called: “She’s changed. I’m worried.”
Is she just becoming a normal teen?
Tears Should Be Surprising
Wynne Morrison
Tears should be surprising.
He is, after all, well over six feet tall,
must top 250 pounds,
always quick and confident
with a joke upon his lips.
Most of his patients weigh a pound or two.
Eyes fused shut, translucent skin,
with lives of needles, tubes,
machines and probing hands.
On this week there are too many
who will never have a chance.
Chocolate, silence, and he hauls
himself up from the office couch.
“At least I can still cry,” he says
and turns back up the stairs to work.