poem
Dr. ParkerIt happens a couple times a month. Maybe it ’s me. Maybe I don’t enunciate well enough. Either way, I go into a patient’s room and it’s usually some glum-looking old guy hang-dogging about in there. He sees me and his face lights up. Good morning Dr. Parker! You ’re here early! Or:Helen wake up, this is Dr. Parker, he did your surgery last night! I stopped correcting them years ago. I don ’t mind. I even embrace it. I’ll be Dr. Parker. Hell yes I will. It’s a nice change of pace. Sometimes I get caught up in it. Start acting a little weird. Arching my eyebrows, making my eyes big and crazed....
Source: Buckeye Surgeon - February 4, 2023 Category: Surgery Authors: Jeffrey Parks MD FACS Source Type: blogs
poem
A List of Famous Hats -after James TateI knew a guy who believed hats evolved to fulfill a function,Purely utilitarian, nothing to do with fashion He further claimed that some hatsWere originally designed to fit the misshapenCranium of some poor soulWho needed to get out of the houseWithout a million wiseguys gawking At his unfortunate deformityThe first pope hat, in fact, was designed for a literal inbred coneheadNapoleon ' s tricorne monstrosity was originally crafted by a nun For a poor orphan girl with skull dominant acromegaly Fascinator hats were godsendsFor self conscious m...
Source: Buckeye Surgeon - January 26, 2023 Category: Surgery Authors: Jeffrey Parks MD FACS Source Type: blogs
poem
Scene ILet ’s get two people on the bank of a riverA man and a woman, both early twentiesHe with a wispy mustache, a bowler hat,Maybe dusty denim overalls She in a white cotton dress, her hairBillowing from under a bonnet There ’s no dialogue But you can tell he wants to say somethingTo her. He only has eyes for herBut she is gazing toward the flowing riverThe camera follows her gazeShe could be watching the driftwoodOr the gnarled roots on the opposite bankOr maybe just mesmerized by the motion of waterThe camera pans in, the frigid river so closeTrickling like chills down your spinePretty soon we...
Source: Buckeye Surgeon - January 24, 2023 Category: Surgery Authors: Jeffrey Parks MD FACS Source Type: blogs
poem
Op Note XXXVHad I known this surgery would be so difficult I would have switched call. I would have transferred it out. Punted. I would have taken my daughter skiing and not gotten frustrated with her when she fell. I would have asked her about school and the pressures of eighth grade life and how I understood and was there anything I could do to help. I wouldn ’t have made inane comments about the unseasonably warm weather, about the lovely view from the lift, the reifying properties of cold air. I would try not to let silence reign, lost in my thoughts worrying about the rocky course of the bowel case in th...
Source: Buckeye Surgeon - January 21, 2023 Category: Surgery Authors: Jeffrey Parks MD FACS Source Type: blogs
poem
3 PebblesYou ought to carry three pebblesIn your pocket every day(Not the one where your keys are keptLest they fall out when a door is unlocked)You ought to carry three pebbles To remind you of the threeThings you aren ’t allowed to forgetIt has to be three, no more or less But the things you can ’t forgetAre subject to certain rules One of the pebbles must always standFor the fact that someday you ’ll dieOne has to remind you of somethingOnly you know about someone you love The last one is a wild cardMost people never assign anythingTo the last pebbleIt ’s too hard to chooseIt becomes a ...
Source: Buckeye Surgeon - January 18, 2023 Category: Surgery Authors: Jeffrey Parks MD FACS Source Type: blogs
poem
Contingency PlanOnce loved we reconfigure as charactersIn someone else ’s dream come true.As conjured participants in another ’s dreamWe inevitably recognize our tenuous status: Our dreamer could wake at any moment.We ’d cease to exist.So we do whatever we can To keep them soundly asleep:Another warm blanketA soft pillowWhite noiseDrawn drapes to hide the moon In the dream I lean over And whisper into her ear:Yes my love, it ’s all real,It isn ’t just a dream1/9/23 (Source: Buckeye Surgeon)
Source: Buckeye Surgeon - January 9, 2023 Category: Surgery Authors: Jeffrey Parks MD FACS Source Type: blogs
poem
Final ArrangementsThis older couple was tellingMe about how they had alreadyPurchased their cemetery plot Successful people, educated,Had paid off all their loans Pillars of some sub-average communityDon ' t get me wrong:It ’s the right thing to doAn act of dispassionate probitySparing mourning childrenThe undignified taskOf final arrangements But I ’ve already decidedIt ’s cremation for me; no one’sPutting my corpse in the wet ground. Being similarly disposed Toward responsible stewardshipI know it ’s time for me to pick a fire Nothing too garishly infernal A simple blaze with ...
Source: Buckeye Surgeon - January 9, 2023 Category: Surgery Authors: Jeffrey Parks MD FACS Source Type: blogs
poem
Op Note XXXIVThe patient was in a perilous state. Critical condition. We had done all that could be done. Maxed out on pressors. Vent settings 100%. It was all up to him now. Everyone seemed to be praying. His mother in the chair to his right, eyes closed, hands clasped, was whispering a prayer. The father prayed with his head bowed. His best friend from childhood was praying. His brother too. The teenage daughter had made her hands into a steeple. A cleaning lady was making the sign of the cross. His wife alternated between weeping and praying, sometimes praying through the weeping. The nurse was m...
Source: Buckeye Surgeon - January 9, 2023 Category: Surgery Authors: Jeffrey Parks MD FACS Source Type: blogs
poem
Had, HaveOnce it was this great feeling I hadOr maybe it had meEither way, tragic possessionLike falling in quicksandThe more you flailThe deeper the digressionNow it ’s just something IhaveLike an old key in a drawerI forget what it opensThis scar on my handOnce a deep woundWish it would bleed again1/5/23 (Source: Buckeye Surgeon)
Source: Buckeye Surgeon - January 5, 2023 Category: Surgery Authors: Jeffrey Parks MD FACS Source Type: blogs
poem
Chicken and EggWhat comes first —God or the desireFor something divine Feast or the hungerLove or stark shivering alone The omnipotent father or the unbegotten son,One of them sayingLet there be light,The rest is darkness The other saying forgiveness,He knows not what he does Just assigning namesTo the timeless eternityIt ’s a chicken and egg thingThe empty hole in our heartsThat gives us something to fillThis right now(I had never noticed before)Is the hinge Between the loverAnd the loved This right hereIs the portal through Which god must passTo get to the place where Eve...
Source: Buckeye Surgeon - January 1, 2023 Category: Surgery Authors: Jeffrey Parks MD FACS Source Type: blogs
poem
Black Hole SonnetYour heart is a star of immeasurableMass and infinite densityYou ’ve drawn into your depthsAll matter — inanimate and fleshAnd all the light of the universeSave a single luminous beam.I get as close as I canWithout falling all the way inTime slows down near the edgeAs I spiral around in ever tighter orbitsUntil time seems to nearly stopOur best chance was always the timelessI ’ll try not to wobble in the non-Time before the inevitable tumble1/1/23 (Source: Buckeye Surgeon)
Source: Buckeye Surgeon - January 1, 2023 Category: Surgery Authors: Jeffrey Parks MD FACS Source Type: blogs
poem
FragmentsThe fragmentary nature of lifeDoesn ' t mean that it ’s brokenAll you need is a narrativeThat wends it all togetherEveryone is writing a storyWe hope will hold forever 12/29/22 (Source: Buckeye Surgeon)
Source: Buckeye Surgeon - December 29, 2022 Category: Surgery Authors: Jeffrey Parks MD FACS Source Type: blogs
poem
RutherfordWe ’re like electrons—Clouds of probabilityUntil improbably seenSomehow we collide —Call it love, call it connectionThen it ’s very RutherfordianDiscrete little balls of energyScything around the same sunIn precisely defined orbitsAs long as you Don ' t veer too farFrom me and I don ’t hide I ’ll remain myself—Distinct mind, a charged body Woven into your strobing sphereBut the second you look away —The lights go out I ’m gone 12/29/22 (Source: Buckeye Surgeon)
Source: Buckeye Surgeon - December 29, 2022 Category: Surgery Authors: Jeffrey Parks MD FACS Source Type: blogs
poem
Poem #44This is a workmanlike poemIt doesn ’t have time for loveIt ’s all been chiseled from stoneIt seeks physical endurance While ceding emotional resonanceTo aspiring sonnets and odes It lacks beautiful imageryDue to disciplined editingIt settles for being a series of small wordsThat convey a simple meaningIt ’s the stagnant waters dulled to opacityDesperately clinging to all the colors In the sky before the clouds come It ’s closing your eyes and counting to tenWhile all the angels are falling You pay it no mind but these Are the ones that get inside Prosody is fine and ...
Source: Buckeye Surgeon - December 22, 2022 Category: Surgery Authors: Jeffrey Parks MD FACS Source Type: blogs
poem
Dream StateMy dreams are never particularly seductiveNot much is happening, reallyBut they draw me in all the sameMaybe I enjoy them more than I let onMaybe I ’m just engrossed in an interesting new systemEvery so often I ’m in an MC Escher structure That resembles my third grade homeroom A moment always comes, though, when I get this hunchThat everything here is just a dreamA whisper from my waking statePerhaps, but I ignore itI just want it all to keep goingI put a lot of effort into having it make sense I ’ve grown comfortable hereI want to see how it all endsPart of me knows that waking up&nb...
Source: Buckeye Surgeon - December 22, 2022 Category: Surgery Authors: Jeffrey Parks MD FACS Source Type: blogs
