poem
Died in Her SleepThe old lady seemed surprisingly stable the next morningGiven her age, the physiologic insult And what I had to do to her. She smiled wanly and reachedOut a soft alabaster hand Not to reassure me so muchAs making sure I was realThat her rapidly spiraling demiseWhat not just a dreamI saw: it ’s not your fault, you did the best you couldIn her eyes but probably Her eyes were just being nice Then she closed them and drifted off into A dream where I was an old man, on my deathbedSurrounded by everyone I loved and those who loved me (A Venn diagram approximating a near...
Source: Buckeye Surgeon - May 24, 2023 Category: Surgery Authors: Jeffrey Parks MD FACS Source Type: blogs
poem
Kentucky DerbyYou ’ll enjoy a day at the derby with me. I ' m the guy always growlingand down the stretch they come! whenever you return from the bar or bathroom. Pantomime galloping on a broom I found in a closet like I ' m on a filly exhorting her to find that extra gear win place or show it ’s a great time, everyone gets paid. I’m the guy without a sophisticated hat, sans bowtie, dressed like a beachcomber because I prefer sea horses to thoroughbreds, the five o ' clock shadow jockey four juleps down the tubes, whipping at thin air with the sinewy thread that wends his whole life together, you ’ll feel the...
Source: Buckeye Surgeon - May 23, 2023 Category: Surgery Authors: Jeffrey Parks MD FACS Source Type: blogs
poem
Poem #46The poem is the intimate conversation You wish you had with anyoneYou ever loved every time You ever saw themInstead of all the mindless prattleThe poem is the deepest, truest connectionThe only link between the living and the deadBetween hope and despairThe past and the presentThe surrender and the battleThe poem scorns a future That tries to kill it Every failed relationship, broken friendship,Inexplicable estrangement is foundedOn a fundamental jealousyA yawning regret that it never became a poemOr maybe it once wasAnd stopped5/22/23 (Source: Buckeye Surgeon)
Source: Buckeye Surgeon - May 22, 2023 Category: Surgery Authors: Jeffrey Parks MD FACS Source Type: blogs
poem
Penitent RoundsSometimes I ’ll block out a little timeAt the end of the day to roundOn all my demented patients.I wait for nurse ’s shift changeWhen everyone is distracted, And then stealthily slip into the roomsOf the lost and forgotten, the actively forgettingClose the door behind meDim the lights and then I justStart dishing dirt, spilling it all outLike the unchewed beans plastered to the front of their gownsI don ’t hold back—About how I ’ve always been Such a liar and a cheatA puffed up phony who Who isn ' t worth the paperMy fancy diploma is printed on(Although itisa nice cotton rag)I ...
Source: Buckeye Surgeon - May 22, 2023 Category: Surgery Authors: Jeffrey Parks MD FACS Source Type: blogs
poem
First ResponderI went to check a pulseAnd when I turned her headHer face was goneInstead of a faceThere were a million wordless thoughtsAnd thousand sacrilegious prayersInstead of a little girlWe ’d become a bodyIn the bushes, gunned down Without a faceNo one smilesYou can ’t even a frown 5/7/23 (Source: Buckeye Surgeon)
Source: Buckeye Surgeon - May 7, 2023 Category: Surgery Authors: Jeffrey Parks MD FACS Source Type: blogs
poem
Op Note XXXIXIt was starting to get ridiculous. I ’d remove a gallbladder and then another would appear. So I’d take that one out too. Blink of an eye and there’d be another. Same place too. Cornered right there between the liver, heart and a hazy kind of darkness. It kept growing back and growing back, over and over and over. But that’s ju st your life, she said. You’re always working. No, I said. You’re wrong. It was the same patient. The same gallbladder. Eternal recurrence and all that. She shook her head. You ’re getting confused, she said. You’re working too hard. The lack of sleep is caus...
Source: Buckeye Surgeon - May 4, 2023 Category: Surgery Authors: Jeffrey Parks MD FACS Source Type: blogs
The joy of surgery: How one doctor discovered her passion
When my now ex-husband and I first met, he asked me about my favorite things to do. At that time, I did not have a ready answer. It was my third year of general surgery residency, a time for proving that I could handle it all: being the in-house senior surgery resident on call, starting
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The joy of surgery: How one doctor discovered her passion originally appeared in KevinMD.com. (Source: Kevin, M.D. - Medical Weblog)
Source: Kevin, M.D. - Medical Weblog - May 3, 2023 Category: General Medicine Authors: Maria Iliakova, MD Tags: Physician Surgery Source Type: blogs
poem
Time-outHe woke to familiar surroundingsThis same bed, at the usual timeIn the stygian hour before dawnA quick confirmation of name and ageDate of birth, identifying sets of digitsMaking sure the numbers match Then to the bathroomTo wash his handsHe washed his feet, his neckHis back and his faceHis whole body glistenedHalf wet, naked in jaundiced light. Before dressing he locked eyesWith the intractable apparitionHolding his gaze in the mirror,That enigmatic innermost onion peelWho never looked upon anyone elseAnd by no other eyes was ever seen And, once again, he accepted the factThat this dead-eyed a...
Source: Buckeye Surgeon - May 1, 2023 Category: Surgery Authors: Jeffrey Parks MD FACS Source Type: blogs
poem
PetrichorThe smell of the rain after a dry stretchLacquers the mind from the rot of doubtBefore the Greeks ever knew of fungal spores They were able to get a certain truth out Divine blood spilt from split stonesWafts around us in the spring gustsHow strong the heart of stone must beTo squeeze its golden blood through veins of rockEvery wet stone after a storm is a kind of corpseThat tells us this must be the place Where a hardness bled to deathSo that a dying man like you could live4/27/23 (Source: Buckeye Surgeon)
Source: Buckeye Surgeon - April 27, 2023 Category: Surgery Authors: Jeffrey Parks MD FACS Source Type: blogs
poem
I ' m Living Until I ' m 100So I am fifty nowNothing to panic about Another year closer to godA word I use as a placeholderBut not for the notion of deathThere is no word for what I meanIt ’s another year further from god tooNeither closer nor furtherStill living, sort of slowly dyingLet ’s simply call it breathingHalf inspiringHalf expiredOld enough to have acquired some wisdomYoung enough to still believe it ’s worth anything Half learned Another half to know All of it soon enough forgotten I love you lifeHalf givenThe other half for the taking4/27/23 (Source: Buckeye Surgeon)
Source: Buckeye Surgeon - April 27, 2023 Category: Surgery Authors: Jeffrey Parks MD FACS Source Type: blogs
poem
Pantheon IArt, the guttural human yelp, an attemptTo warble the lyrical language of the godsBut ignorant of words, without access To any syntax of the celestial tongue Without knowing if they differentiateBetween nouns, adjectives or verbs If they recognize any grammatical constraints If, as gods, they even know themselves as “gods”Nevertheless!We have at it with ourNovels and poems, paintings and sculpturesGnawing at deeper divine scriptures Adorable little toddlers babbling nonsenseAbout our very specialdrawingsOur rictal scribblings, our measly tracingsCrying when mommy doesn ' t payit...
Source: Buckeye Surgeon - April 22, 2023 Category: Surgery Authors: Jeffrey Parks MD FACS Source Type: blogs
poem
Pantheon IIWhen I was a boy it didn ’t take long before I was Eye rolling away from the holy rollers,The stern prophets of the One True GodDabbled uneasily for a while as a nihilist atheistSoftened into a mildly antagonistic agnosticBefore settling into a comfortableMiddle aged disengagement:Let me just live this stupid life, OK?But it never goes awayThose nagging doubtsHow do you ever know for sure?So you hope for detenteA gentleman ' s agreementGive me a little spaceBut don ' t forget me entirelyIt gets all dysfunctionalAs deeply woven relationships tendNo one god could be Everything we needAnd, frankly...
Source: Buckeye Surgeon - April 22, 2023 Category: Surgery Authors: Jeffrey Parks MD FACS Source Type: blogs
poem
Au SableThe summer before residency started in ChicagoI went north to Grayling, Michigan with a backpackAnd the last of a dreamy eyed sociopathic certaintyTo spend a weekend fly fishing on the edgesOf the swift black flat Au Sable river.I thought I had it all won,I ’d played some cards wellParlayed a little luck into a tidy stack That bought me access to higher stakes tables. I was ready to roll the dice and gamble.But first, before sitting down with the high rollersIt was off to the swift black Au Sable river In the summer before the illusions fractured,Before I realized everything I hadBarely cover...
Source: Buckeye Surgeon - April 16, 2023 Category: Surgery Authors: Jeffrey Parks MD FACS Source Type: blogs
poem
Dead GrandmaThe other day I had this gnawing urge to talk to my dead grandma —the one I called “Grandma” when speaking to her and “Grandma Parks” when I was talking to someone else about her. Not my Grandma Izzy, who’s also dead, the one I really liked. My dad’s mom, I’m talking about. I won ' t go so far as to say that I disliked her. She was fine. I mean she was ok. Always there at the holidays. Made a mean lemon pie. Taught us all how to play Skip-Bo. She was just boring as a conversationalist. Droning on and on about her colored pencil pictures. And always with the same boring stories. I reminded ...
Source: Buckeye Surgeon - April 15, 2023 Category: Surgery Authors: Jeffrey Parks MD FACS Source Type: blogs
easter poem
Op Note XXXVIIIJust once I ’d like to open up an abdomen and find something unexpected. Utterly unique and unprecedented.. Instead of a liver, a codfish. Instead of a spleen, an antique clock. A giant pair of scissors. A barrette this girl from middle school used to wear in her hair. I’d write a paper about it. Get it acc epted by peer reviewed journals. Present my findings to the International Society of Distinguished Anatomists. Make my bones as an academician. Give talks to passionate coteries of pond side geese. In textbooks it would become known as the Parks Variation of organ system configuration. Every few...
Source: Buckeye Surgeon - April 9, 2023 Category: Surgery Authors: Jeffrey Parks MD FACS Source Type: blogs
