Dedication
To my patients and to the Profession of Medicine.
"By making us stop for a moment, poetry gives us an opportunity to think about ourselves as human beings on this planet and what we mean to each other."
Rita Dove
Marquis
When love impales the heart,
a child's heart,
and first breaths bellow,
and his gentle hands
and soul so mellow
beholds the gift of life so dear,
we affirm that what we hear,
resounding cry without thought
or pain or tear,
is his marquis,
his sentinel of
what we do
and why.
And now he claims for us nobility,
this guardian of ancient temples
royalty lusting to comfort;
longing to heal; unsparing in compassion,
leaving with honor and beneficence
his name undying,
a bequest to us who love him
and to our hearts ...forever crying.
I am an artisan,
A painter of hues unfading
To blend upon my pallet
Infinite promise
And emblazon on my soul
A landscaped canvas
Stretched to infinity
Between pillars of prayer.
Neither stalked nor
Conspired against am I.
Only Fate has been my betrayer.
And although the defenses
Of my mortal flesh have weakened,
The borders of my body
And the cisterns of my soul
Are strong, alive
With pulses of blood
And liquors of hope.
I will not lament
Nor ask of this from you.
I will not know defeat
Or the wrath of any pain
For I, like a solitary seedling
That yearns to taste the falling rain,
Know well that God's eyes alone
Will shed but triumphant tears...
...Upon my brow for me
And for my covenant of victory.
"Out of my window the strings of the
harp are struck, Oh, my heart! How is
it so deeply entangled in the echoes!
There is the limitless sound of the trees,
there is the limitless brightness of the moon"
Today the sun cast hues of hope.
Open eyes and grimaces,
Heart beat flutters,
Angel cries.
And then serenity.
A life lived long enough
To taste the sweetness of
A mother's kiss,
A father's kiss;
Caresses and caresses
And whispers,
And kisses again and again.
Blessings, prayers, tears;
Moans of weeping.
Silent moments.
Raging thoughts.
Peaceful thoughts
Which memory's keeping.
No shadows.
Pure light.
Eternal light.
From sun and stars and moon glow.
Save the night of today
When the moon eclipsed, turns umber.
And
She be our gift, forever.
He, the doctor;
plays the theatres of maladies,
thrusts deep into
entwined complexities
of life's forces which
penetrate nearly to death...
and to death,
while spectator-less
scenes amass of wretched disease,
spurning wrath of reason,
and frames of frozen helplessness,
turn towards thresholds of despair...
but not crossing.
The healer;
lusts against disease,
at his rostrum his faculty
to gift preservation,
to imagine suffering
and bring imaginable defeat;
to lift endless torment
with gentle hands of dignity;
to gaze at pain but see life;
to ponder its wonderment
and ironies, peel away its injustice,
and unearth the marbled core of its soul;
to smile, to cry, and now to pause.
The scholar;
who unaccustomed to
senescence, though lighter now
of visible labour, will remain
to till our minds with wisdom and
leave in its furrows, the very families
of humanity he served and bettered;
a shining light, arousing and inspiring,
a never-exhausting actor who compels
an operating theatre of great drama,
of untiring hope…
and amidst the extremes of misery,
of indefatigable compassion,
for it is he who defines
“physician”.
I have born my soul to God, my son.
As he slipped into the crevice of death,
I could not watch nor see his image before me,
But I knew of the perfect beauty of his body
Even when he nestled within me,
For he is loved as a mother loves a son
And no pearl nor ruby nor even diamond
Can light the shards of shattered dreams
More than this love.
Peace will come to me, I know
And my son, my soul,
Will take from each
Of my uncountable tears
Eternal sustenance as he rests
Now in the body of our earth
And learns that what we know
As the saddest sadness
Is but a gate into the mystical
And miraculous wonders of
Tribulation, promise and hope.
The East Wind, connected with Aurora, the Dawn
"If she is a saint, then her symbol is the Thistle"
Born with skin as soft as thistle-down,
And tearless cries resounding,
You are of the wind which bellows in our breasts,
A miracle in a world of miracles.
You have severed the doubts of uncertainty,
With vestal vision you bind our hearts in unity
And when we speak of love and peaceful dreaming,
We look at you and see the Fringe of daylight
Streaming into our hearts
Porcelined colors of the dawn.
In my home, you were my light.
Your blood, my life,.
Your love my love.
In my home all your heartbeats were for me .
And when my heart,
Once a fleet and aflutter
With sonorous marching did now falter,
I had not the wish
To forewarn nor advise.
For I could hear the calling
Of an angel's rhapsody and
From afar see small lights
Marking passage heavenly,
Trailing embered footsteps
To forever guide your thoughts
Of me your child.
You the master of art
Witness no illusion to
What you have done,
For you have written scriptures
For promise and yearning,
You have wedded victoriously
The intellect and the passion,
The form and the fashion...
For...learning,
Necessities, as the shoulders of our children
Carry forth from your faculty
Weights of truth and discovery
Summoned when the silence of the night
Is pierced with calamities
And the arduousness of the day
Crave creative wonder.
And we know...although the assent,
Set in the scorched air
Of ten Augusts passed,
Is now completed
In the shining of this Springtime...
Reverence and friendship,
Like the very soul of Art
Is never lost,
But as the seasons themselves,
Endures in cascading timelessness.
I know where songs are made
And where simple words are born.
It is in the hearts of dreamers,
And in souls of those who mourn.
With lyric, love and tearful sorrow,
Music comes alive,
Giving death a reason,
Assuring we’ll survive.
And when the music dissipates
And only words remain,
It is the words that last forever,
Soothing sorrow, healing pain.
Words inscribed indelible
In our books for young and old,
Words that open minds as flowers
Whose petals in the spring, unfold.
William has bequeathed to us
Like these words of which I write,
Enduring love and gilded wisdom,
Every minute, hour, day and night.
So read the books and see their words
Enlighten your children’s' minds,
For there is no greater beauty
Than the beauty words define.
"I am part of all that I have met;
Yet, all experience is an arch where through
Gleams that untraveled world whose margin fades
Forever and forever when I move.
How dull it is to pause, to make an end,
To rust unburnished, not to shine in use"
i.
They number hundreds of thousands, his words;
Arranged in manuscripts;
Theses, hypotheses;
Truths,
Nestled between the long shadows of science
And the tall pillars of scientists;
Searching to unravel the paradox
Of chaos from the order which is life.
ii.
They number hundreds, his students;
Children of his intellect;
Beneficiaries of his passion,
So vital that its privilege
Is not of teacher, but of Mentor;
With wisdom to be guide and
Faithful counselor
As he feeds the fires of their aspirations,
And the fragments of their dreams,
Each a child itself,
Longing to grow and understand
And conquer the haunting
We call disease,
The maladies of illness.
iii.
And they number twenty-two, our years together;
Father to his students,
Father to his children,
Grandfather to his greatest joys;
We celebrate [tonight] our
Privilege of being his colleague
And share in his transition from leader to
Forefather
Of what remains to be discovered,
As our Mentor pursues
Those fortunes of medicine
Which as the ancient's decried:
'Will vanquish misery
And grievous disease.'
i.
Summoned by the voice of destiny,
We peel our skins of daily toil,
Our moments of banal routine,
And stare beyond reflection as
Azure skies blacken and
Blossoms freeze and fall;
As elements seek reason.
Yet living remains a promise,
Beckoning, yet not begging.
Nesting in sinuous branches,
Forgiving; not forgetting.
Singing; not rejoicing.
Weeping; but not crying.
ii.
For there is no tarnish
On his breaths of gold;
No decay.
His virtue reigns,
Fusing generation to generation,
Parent to progeny, young to old.
Though mortality is certain,
Its finality, its eternity,
Endures in those sacred passions
And deeds bequeathed, today;
As we shed our carapace
To unfurl life's grandeur
Of simply love and grace,
And gifted time…
Beyond dismay.
O child!...On thy head
The glory of the morn is shed
Like a celestial benison!
Here at the portal thou dost stand,
And with thy little hand
Thou openest the mysterious gate
Into the future's undiscovered land
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
Beyond
the limestone
obelisks
and spired temples'
towering climbs,
come miracles
from your children
who touch
a simple candle flame
and with neither
fear nor pain,
turn fire
to wick and smoke,
and welcome
peaceful darkness,
...who vanquish
massive pyres
that burn
portraits to ashen sketches
to scatter
about the crevices
and pitted skins
of ancient stones,
who quell the squalor
of fallen hopes
and fill our cisterns
with art and poems
Behold
your children,
wisdom be their strength.
In conflagrations
their reach
will quench
life's
weightless fires
to shine
a promise
through window panes
upon your Temple's spires.
Love insists our hope
Hidden in winter's facade.
A child. An image.
A memory. A promise.
Yet,
We shall unveil its wonder;
…The gift of tomorrow,
And why we love, today.
In solemn silence we walk the woods
beneath the boughs of willows, wailing
In a room of silent tears
You gathered in your sorrow
Hovered , hugged;
Gazed bewildered;
Why I"ll not live tomorrow.
In a room of silent tears;
If I could, I'd cry;
Out loud; To tell
Of this secret moment
Of why today I die.
My lot was cast at this hour,
Which birth and death both share,
Yet understand the sense and reason
God Loves; God calls;
God cares.
I now reside in peace
As you grieve and say goodbye;
Shedding tears with immortal heavens
Yes, even the stars have cried.
I loved the river:
Enchanting.
I loved the wind:
Caressing.
I loved the daylight:
Soothing.
I loved the starlight:
Haunting.
I loved my ‘dear ones’:
Being.
I am now all that I loved:
Blessing.
In prayer we plead return,
And in dream, awaken!
We fall to stare at gleaned grasses
Scattered about forgotten fields,
Singed by a senseless lot,
And thirst to cry forever.
Yet,
We will not be draped
In the blanket of loneliness called solitude.
For deaf of song and absent of vision
Of who we are and who are our children,
Its veil will descend, then disappear.
We are "alive together".
The margin between breath and breathless
Is narrow, like twilight and darkness.
Moments of simple thoughts
Become ageless memories.
There is triumph to taste,
Love to embrace;
Havens of hope to inhabit.
Soon, the curtains of chaos
Will rise with the setting stars
As memories of joy
Bond with joy itself
And we will smile once more,
At last to breathe a painless sigh
Of what is love.
I could not cry, though my eyes wept.
I listened, then paused,
Mesmerized.
Tantalized.
Digesting.
I felt a fury. I craved to hear more.
I asked how could this be?
This young Doctor
Who writes and speaks as an elder; a prophet.
Knowledgeable of the flesh which marks us;
Of our souls which bind us;
And of the tapestries of humanity,
Fragile and vulnerable as they are,
Who strive to overcome
Stains of prejudice and disease.
And then I listened again,
To her, the Accentor of a profession,
Struggling with its privilege and meaning,
And I smiled,
For I know I have heard from her tongue,
The trumpet-call of Hope.
(Eternity)
Could I have died so soon,
So soon that my cries
Were silenced in your womb?
So soon that I'll never touch
Your breast nor feel
Your hands caress
My brow?
So soon that you never got
To sigh and cry
Sweet tears of joy,
For your first child,
Your first born boy?
Could I have died so soon?
I suspect not,
For I felt the passion
Of your love around me
As my heartbeats slowed,
Then stopped.
As I lay motionless,
I heard the misery
In your cries that
I would not be born alive
And wondered, why?
Yesterday father, you fathered me.
Today dear mother, you birthed me.
I was there, You were there.
We all stood witness.
I heard your whispers,
That you love me.
I heard you tell each other
How beautiful I was viewed
In my eternal quietude.
I even felt your soft caress
As you held me to your breast.
On this morn, mourn not for me.
With ethereal grace I have a name.
I have a home, I have a life...
To live through all eternity.
I loved
the quiet time I spent
when every heart beat
you had sent
to my flesh
and to my skin
flowed forth to bring
me peace within
your silent womb,
...I loved the silent time.
And even as
my tiny heart
labored at death's call
before my start
at birth and life,
and as I ailed,
soon no longer
to inhale
or feel your pulse to mine,
...I loved the quiet time.
My body now
apart from yours,
still lives, yet not
upon your shores,
and suffers not
nor is in pain
for within
its new domain
I can love the quiet time.
...I loved the quiet time.
Thee,
I've touched
and kissed,
and loved you...
... now I
float in
clouds
above you.
Memories
please me
from my
past
transparent shadows
purely
cast.
Though my
corpse
on earth
remains
My spirit lives
in this
domain...
...And like a rose
in desert's
sun.
A miracle
is what
I have
become.
When winter's gloom succumbs,
and grief melts in the sun,
warm currents on my breast will stream,
and turn frosted tears to sunbeams...
Sadness moistens my brow like
mist. Silent tears coalesce upon my cheeks.
Petrified by the cold of winter,
Forgotten by the spring thaw,
I shiver and feel lost
in this the season of my sorrow.
Loss has embraced me more than
once, yet it has never seized me.
Hope has been my reclamation,
My emancipation,
From the bondage of despair.
Hope exists in the swelter
Of summer and persists
As the leaves fall in November.
Hope thaws the snows of winter.
Hope does not forget.
Every day awakens
With kisses on your brow;
With mist that veils the early light
And hides the morning clouds.
With butterfly breaths of longer days
Where heard are fewer sighs,
And echoes from a mountain's song,
Dissolving plaintive cries.
No longer will the seasons part
The year; dividing into four.
Now hours blend to days and weeks,
Weeks to months, forever more.
Every day awakens
With visions of what's to be:
Spheres full of joy and wonder,
Timeless moments of Infinity.
Winds drift on ephemeral wings
To watch the sun's veil lift.
Distant, darkened skies crack clouds.
Humans cry out loud.
As I kneel to meet my death
Mortal and frail, I fall
With ravaged mind abused
And hide in temples
Of immortal winter sequestered
From one life's end
To the end of all and wait
As infinity becomes my soul
To be yourself in a world that is constantly trying to make you something else is the greatest accomplishment.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
Fortunate, are those
whose lives so fragile,
And in just being, so struggle
To feel a sense of freedom
From the pain
Of malaise and hunger,
And the maladies
Which from the formative years
Steal their persona;
Fortunate are those
Whose lives are touched by you.
You have learned and witnessed,
Taught and practiced
The tenets of what it means to give,
And live your dream.
And now, with profound kindness…
You will overwhelm the pity of physical agony,
You will plant seeds of happiness in gardens
Disrupted by blight and sorrow.
You will care when caring seems lost.
You will cry when caring has lost.
You will smile when your kindness creates peace.
And of tomorrow,
You will see
Through mists of uncertainties
Which veil the newly born and older.
And with passion, skills and fervor,
Pursue cure and order
For afflictions of a blameless child.
As no greater worth is there
Than for you to share what
Rests inherent in your heart:
Your Art, Your soul, your sense
Of right and wrong.
And above the rest,
A righteous ethic that strives,
Without pretense, to heal, lifelong.
I have stood here before
When birth deceived and
Surrendered to my hands
The very spirit and soul of humanity;
The essence of life, save life itself .
And I have touched before
The angle hair and silken skin;
A child lay bare, still and silent
In these outstretched hands
As my will cried out
To scream a breath of life
Into his pale lips
Now frozen in the mist
Of endless dreams.
Yet today I smile
As I have smiled before,
For from such drear
Comes a voice;
A voice, so serene
That it transforms
The searing pain felt in
Our hearts into song;
Melting stones of sorrow
Into liquors of love,
Forever a memory
of our dear Child.
I have seen the caul
like honey glazed
contain and bathe
in sweet succor,
kept watch as
mother's wombs
tear in pain to
bear their child
and then as if my first,
stood aside and
cried with awe at
the birth, that quiescent harbor
where life sings
psalmic verses
of calms and storms
rains and droughts
sun lights and dark nights,
agendas to live on forever.
The first song on earth
Was a child's cry,
A canticle of absolute beauty.
Each note a bequest for eternity;
Ageless music of heart-sounds
And first-breath sighs
To immortalize
The promise of humankind.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
Fortunate, are those
whose lives so fragile,
And in just being, so struggle
To feel a sense of freedom
From the pain
Of malaise and hunger,
And the maladies
Which from the formative years
Steal their persona;
Fortunate are those
Whose lives are touched by you.
You have learned and witnessed,
Taught and practiced
The tenets of what it means to give,
And live your dream.
And now, with profound kindness…
You will overwhelm the pity of physical agony,
You will plant seeds of happiness in gardens
Disrupted by blight and sorrow.
You will care when caring seems lost.
You will cry when caring has lost.
You will smile when your kindness creates peace.
And of tomorrow,
You will see
Through mists of uncertainties
Which veil the newly born and older.
And with passion, skills and fervor,
Pursue cure and order
For afflictions of a blameless child.
As no greater worth is there
Than for you to share what
Rests inherent in your heart:
Your Art, Your soul, your sense
Of right and wrong.
And above the rest,
A righteous ethic that strives,
Without pretense, to heal, lifelong.
Belonging to the Spring
Undaunted, I greet the paradox of spring.
I dream …of golden notes
Floating in the silent night.
Joys of breaths and heartbeats
Simple passions of delight
Sing on winds diaphanous,
Of the glory of the bloom
Which never disappointing,
Soon, bathes all beloved
With perfect hope.
It is the season of opulence
When sweetness obscures
Dark halls of winter's liar
And dew upon the grasses
Cast light of morning's hour
Into the windows of the soul
Where fragments of loveliness…
Of love, coalesce
Into being,
Magnificence.
You are my bright star,
Aglow with a radiance far,
Equaled by only Aurora, herself.
You shine in the evening
With a splendor equal to her dawn.
And deep into the night you illumine,
From the soft light cast through the
Frosted panes of the moonlit window.
A score of years has passed. I reflect.
With no regrets, I suspect
Another score or more we will spend
Together, with our children and theirs.
Generations to care; and to share
our love
You are a consummate obsession,
A mind's sole possession.
A shadow cast from memory
Of splendid specter and rhapsody.
A venerable vision, if only a dream,
Closer to reality so it seems.
But dreams end abruptly when the body awakens
When from one's mind they are suddenly taken.
Not to appear for seasons to follow,
Yet always returning like the augural swallow.
Now, such dreams return to my mind,
To quest for the truth, be it blessed or unkind.
I will see you once again,
Before my final dream,
When winter's coat of snows remain,
In springtime pools and streams.
I will gaze within those pools,
Upon your bright reflection;
Mirrored image of virtues true,
A dearest recollection.
I will be with you in love,
Your life I'll rhapsodize.
A deeper passion need not I prove,
When death doth close my eyes.
for all children, lost
You are my quiet darling.
Your eyes, like morning burn
The minutes of futility
To contrite hours, turn
Eastward where begins the dance
Of ocean tides, and slumbers still
The famine of our grief, to hide
So deep within my wounded will.
A promise, poisoned from the start
So brief without reply or song
Did graze your spirit in my field.
"Return to me" I cry, I long.
As chaos prods my anguish, yet
Neglecting fortunes in my soul,
Tinted hues of destiny
Are tender thoughts which sorrow stole
From me when first I heard your voice;
Each murmur on your breath that sang
Like harps converging as a choir,
And chimes afar, with passion, rang.
You are my quiet darling
Within a cold and flame-less fire,
And I, a prism in the shadows;
A silent martyr for desire.
From oblivion to infinity
without origin or finality,
our minds petrify like fossils
ancestral passions
to consummate all life's promises,
while above us wind-songs cleave
one cloud in two,
two to four, four to eight
and create
infinite dispersions
so we may see
stars flicker,
moonbeams' shadow
sentinels for sunlight's travel,
...and watchtowers for the treasures
of eternal hope.
I have shed my garments and
With calloused feet walk naked
Into the straw meadows of the dark.
My sustenance though vaporized
Floats like the clouds,
Glisters like the stars.
And as I search and cry in fear
I glance into the blackened sky
To see droplets now appear
Like diamonds from our sacred earth
That burnish in this darkest night
To become dreams of promised light.
There is not much our lives to long
but breath the air, hear a song,
walk beneath some sapling pines
search a dream, slow the time,
See truths distant horizons hide
float on waves at even-tide,
You touch my golden hair
With silken fingers
and hands afire with
Embers of love.
Like earthen stones
And sea-born sand
You are the infinite
Minerals of my life.
With you,
I am the mountains,
The forests and the seas.
With you
I have foundation,
Elements, for my being.
Every breath I breath
is for you,
And you, for me.
For always...
my dearests. my family.
The Existence of virtue
depends entirely upon its use”
Cicero
My friend.
Our Integrity is measured
Not by the expense of time
But by its means:
How we live,
Whom we love,
What we sense and feel.
Fueled by spirit,
Kindled by reason,
We assume a purpose.
Furrows of our palms
Map our travail;
Fingers, its instruments,
Voice its praise.
Traversing age of years,
We are valued by our deeds.
And our prosperity becomes
The reward of our virtues.
Naked are our thoughts,
Our souls are crying..
We are your voices,
Denying,
Sorrow’s silence.
For as we speak, alas,
We sing;
And proclaim to all
Our love for You
And from you the love
You bring.
Forlorn, with tears
And cries, am I.
To lose you to your death
Without but even gasp or sigh,
Save a wisp of Angels breath;
…the darkest sorrow
I have known. Yet,
Your image burnt in my
Soul is my gift, my grace,
And always will I see your face
Upon the simmer of
Placid ponds
And in the clouds where
Sunbeams hide
And raindrops form,
…And I will speak kind words
And write of you
And sing in sweet demure,
In early morning's dew
And in the crown of daffodils
Which bloom amidst the storms
Swept cross my brow,
In every dream
In which it seems
You come to me.
My love forever
Do I avow.
How we love to come here
With our innocent hearts,
Here where blossoms bloom,
Garden-trees flower and
Shadows shiver in gentle winds;
Where fertile soil sows its fruits
Hosting moments of passing time.
Where in early morning, dew
Drips from satin petals
And tendrils of daylight stream
Until whispers of evening breezes
Float off the Sound;
As our wondering thoughts
In silent moments
Of peaceful dreaming
Lighten, and at last,
Our hearts adorned,
Unfold to plant unfailing roots
And reach for moonbeams
And beyond.
I grasped his strong hand
weeping edema beneath
mottled skin and
pulsed coded messages.
Then with a kiss
placed gently upon his brow,
withdrew, and said good-bye.
Around us, aprons of sand
embroidered shores of saline oceans.
Inland, grasses wove their tapestries.
Grains, blades and salted pools mingle;
reservoirs for creation,
repositories for death.
Silent is our
morning's song,
lost our morning's glory.
The grasses, stilled by quiet winds sleep
day-long now. Rays of crimson sunbeams
like thorns, pierce
the clouds of our despair
as our dissonant cries fade
into nothingness.
the limestone
obelisks
and spired temples'
towering climbs,
come miracles
from your children
who touch
a simple candle flame
and with neither
fear nor pain,
turn fire
to wick and smoke,
and welcome
peaceful darkness,
...who vanquish
massive pyres
that burn
portraits to ashen sketches
to scatter
about the crevices
and pitted skins
of ancient stones,
who quell the squalor
of fallen hopes
and fill our cisterns
with art and poems
Behold
your children,
wisdom be their strength.
In conflagrations
their reach
will quench
life's
weightless fires
to shine
a promise
through window panes
upon your Temple's spires.
Raindrops fall
uncounted and annonymous.
Through ages
amid the floods and famines,
quakes and quagmires,
hurricanes and holocausts,
Progenies flourish.
My tears fall one drop by one,
and imprint in my heart forever,
nurture to my children
whose flesh holds the seeds
of my contentment:
When they grow I am their source,
When they flower, I am their Sun.
My tomorrows become a lamplight.
All else is nothingness.
One may return to the place of his birth,
He cannot go back to his youth.
John Burroughs,"The Return," Bird and Bough,
1906.
We return to a house that is no longer,
Our families have moved or passed on.
We walk the neighborhood; but our friends
Are not at play ; For they too all have gone
Our school buildings stand tall,
But the shapers of our minds do not.
The village has become a mall.
Main street is a highway.
Transported home, we relive our youth.
From our memories comes warmth,
Fondness; security; comfort.
Going home is remembering.
The past is safe
for we know what came forth.
"I am a Jew. Hath not a Jew eyes? Hath not a
Jew hands, organs, dimensions, senses, affections, passions?
Shakespeare, The Merchant of Venice
Do not unveil your face, I warn,
Or the very strength
And resolve of mind, born
Within my soul, will set your permanent demise.
For you, called Prejudice, are weak. Your ramparts
Succumb moment to moment
From the truths enshrined in my heart.
I am the Jewish people.
I have endured thousands of years
Under the laden clouds of your adversity.
Your fears of my interminable survival are
genuine.
Today my heart vows,
Never to allow you salvation.
I have taught my children morality
And caring, tolerance and sharing.
I have eschewed hatred.
Like nectar, my blood is sweetened with rhapsodic
Sounds of kind and gentle thoughts and deeds.
I am at once benefactor and inheritor of ageless
Traditions and celebrations of life
Which renounce your vile,
Salined blood of discrimination.
I have witnessed your curse. I have been pained
By the perpetual violence
That has flowed in your veins;
In your flesh.
Yet, my spirit is immortal,
My promise strong.
Soon your putrid vapors
Will dissipate into nothingness;
Only your carcass will remain as
Testimony to your evil.
A peaceful feather falls to earth
Alighted from a dove.
Although so simple, it states its worth,
A symbol of our love.
Soft and silent, gliding down,
Now closer to my heart.
It comes to rest upon the ground,
A precious work of art.
Among the leaves it finds a nest
To lay from Fall to Spring.
A welcome place for it to rest
Until the swallows sing.
The passion of the winds in March
Then cast this plume to sea.
Where it did drift, a wayward ark,
Alone, but always free.
I found this feather on the shore
Among the rocks and reeds.
And to my breast forever more,
Fulfillment of my greatest needs.
I remember the rainbows.
The simplicities of youth: smiles, laughter,
Quixotic dreams; my mind filled with
Poetic thoughts of conquest.
Of stormy nights and of
Rain-soaked days there were many, but
I only remember the rainbows.
When I sat in the woods, I
Watched the light from the morning sun
Gleam through a phalanx of oak trees.
And I climbed to the highest rock and dreamed,
That I was one with the clouds, afloat,
Above the verdant land
That was my home.
And then, set upon the shores,
I would stare at the waves rolling softly towards
The beach. And I questioned how long the sea
Has been the sea, and wondered if these same waters
Were traveled on by the ancients.
I bemoaned the poor and the sick and the weak.
With vows to help I sought out my fate.
With rapture, and a spark of enthusiasm,
I've become a healer.
An autobiographical introspection
If my years be four score and ten,
Then at this midpoint I should pause to reflect
On what's to come and what has been.
I've amassed much riches, though not much wealth,
What has been my gold has been my health,
And my children and my loving wife.
No man has breathed more love than I
For a God that has given to me
These "cherished purposes of life"
For which I would die
So that they would survive for eternity.
A poem for my family upon my 45th birthday..
The asphodel is of the lily family and was
associated with eternal spirits
In Greek mythology, Aoede
was the muse of song
The first song on earth
was a child's cry,
ageless music of heart-sounds
and first-breath sighs
to immortalize
the promise of humankind,
and insist our hope...
for children everywhere
to dance
and laugh aloud
and sing
on winds diaphanous
and to bring
us sanguine visions
that melt the frosted tears of winter's cry,
and beget once more the songs we love
from every child's first-breath sigh.
The knowledge and images of innocent children in war-ravaged cities and countries inspired me to write and dedicate this poem to "the child", with a New Year hope for safety, peace, love and health for all children, world-wide. (January 1, 2017)
A poem dedicated to and in memory of Shep Nuland,
my mentor, friend, renowned author and
professor at the Yale School of Medicine
Truth.
The frigid air frosts our skins. March, unrelenting, chills us.
The carapace of virtue stripped bare with one last breath; a sigh,
a thought, a song, a prayer, a plea, perhaps a smile.
Aware that we must all leave but before, must cleave
from every moment every morsel of that which humanity has gifted us.
He knows of scythes that gleaned, of seeds spilled then
rearranged, in wombs of fragile, fallen leaves where rooted
embryos await to season next; incarnate, reverent, to bare and bloom,
to live again and die and live and die and live.
And we know the seeds of all nobility remain alive in deeds
of noble men as he.
Of men that live and write of worth and truth
and yearn to teach, abet and heal and love the words of centuries past,
unfinished some, and others cast anew to burn in hearts where shadows
rise and fall to crave his wisdom, pillars forged by mind and hands for all.
His scalpel carves it path. The body, impotent to maladies;
thirsts for harmonies of cure by gentle ways and artful skills
to dignify the countless souls infirmed and helpless wills;
and of those he healed, now left to wail, doleful as diaphones
in morning fog they mourn until they sleep.
Truth.
Our heavy hearts will lighten as we remember brighter moments.
His deeds bequeath immortal dreams. Petrified in our senses,
visions indelible, a benevolence to appear and reappear like seasons,
and remind us that we shared in words or voice, in thoughts or touch,
the sacred air he breathed each day.
Nadiyb: Hebrew: A Nobel Man
My tears are watermarks
Which imprint forever
Sentient reminders of gentle hopes
And dreams subdued.
Extant in painful thought they are
And sleep afar
In caves of ancient echoes
Wailing for my perished child
Who now guised in angel's silk
Sings madrigals of sweet delight
And turns my tears heavenward
To drift peacefully into the
Forgiving canyons of winters night.
Memnon, the son of Eos, Goddess of Dawn, who mourned his death by weeping every morning.
Today, the harvest is behind us
Yet as much, it lies ahead.
We plant our seeds even as the icy sun
Strains to warm the earth.
We prepare. We are sure the
Brilliance of the blossom will come to be
And the scent of the lilac tree
Will penetrate the early mist
of springtime once again
And we watch and turn a smile;
watch as ponds and serpentine streams,
Relentless in their ebb and flow,
Carve channels of ancient thoughts and dreams
Like fossilized intaglio
And should we travel on northern trails
And western peaks and pastel fields
And sense the scents of daffodils
And the melodies of songbirds,
We will revel in the excesses of the heart;
The splendor of the day;
The quietude at night;
Among countless raindrops on countless petals,
And sunrises splashed in pink and white.
Yes, today, the harvest is behind us
Yet as much, it lies ahead.
A poem to honor Donna Wilson upon her retirement
Medicus Nihil Aliud Est Quam Animan Consollatio"
"A Doctor is nothing but the constellation of the soul"
We are a constellation.
Our wonders and turmoils:
Of caring; grasps science and skills with hope;
Of understanding; grasps measurement and analysis with insight.
Caring; understanding;
Beacons of what drives us to do what is best.
We are a constellation.
Compelled by mission.
Consumed with passion;
No one leader;
A team of many;
With many bright stars
But none brighter
Than whom we honor
A devoted voice
For the patient;
A just and reasoned voice
For us all.
Our thank yous cannot be enough
But our blessings are abundant.
Thank you and greatest of wishes.
The moon's thin crescent
casts dim spears
of speckled light upon the
path I walked this night
with your hands in mine.
And although darkness
hovers close above our bodies,
warmed with dew's sweet tears,
you turn you eyes to mine
to see the embers shine
and burn to ash all despair
within the abyss of my soul
and praise tomorrow's scented air
I breath, for now my body's whole.
1994
For a brave young boy who went through successful
neurosurgery.
By reason unexplained
came the wrath of nature's
will and pain upon an olive tree,
to cleave unequal its fair soul
and hurl each fracture into
stormy destiny. And as time
and hope and prayer
within an earthen womb
nurtured tendril branches
where buds and blossoms bloom,
I cried, for I was first to
see a morning dove bear a leaflet
in the Spring and fly
homewards... for eternity.
1994
For a mother and newborn both critically ill at birth
but in time were healed. The newborn, Jacob, was
delivered at twenty four weeks gestation and weighed
one and one half pounds at birth. I witnessed his growth
to four pounds when he left the hospital for home.
Your cries sing of
past sorrows,
Sing no songs for me.
For my heart lusts to
live... tomorrow, And my
soul longs to be free.
No longer will angst
befall you
When at my birth you hear
The cries I sing of life anew,
And you kiss away my tears.
1994
Be free
Imprisoned one,
Last remains
Of a fallen tree
Fractured by an
August storm,
Sapped and devoured,
Hollowed from decay,
Destitute of life's
Precious humors.
Debris encrusts your
Body like a death shroud,
Yet the poet knows your
spirit,
The artist your beauty.
Be free.
1993
Gone are ten thousand days
of perfumed winds
bellowed from the
lungs of God with
gusts and drafts that
scattered wandering seeds
of despair, craving
earthen roots to anchor
their promise of reborn
hope.
1993
Lines of profound past loss and future hope.
Appareled in a veil of grace,
Angst and despair showed its face.
Yet from your eyes a gleam did shine,
A hint of nature's grand design.
To teach us all that we must cope,
And never lose our faith and hope.
That all things bad and all things sad
Will be eclipsed by what makes us glad:
Love and trust in one another.
Wholesome values as father, mother.
Embracing our children sweet and fair,
Holding their hands, combing their hair.
These are the flames that within us burn,
The passions strong for which we yearn.
So while today your loss brings drear,
The morrow's sunshine will again appear.
1992
Written for a young couple who underwent a
termination of pregnancy for a lethal genetic
anomaly. They had a wonderful understanding of
each other and a devotion to their three old daughter
that allowed them to face their bereavement with
strength and hope.
"All we know
Of what they do above,
Is that they happy are,
and that they love."
Edmund Waller
If I could wish myself a dream,
It would be to retreat for a lifetime and hide
From a world of unjust suffering
Where mankind's afflictions and pains reside.
I'd labor to quarry limestone and granite
To fashion for my very own
A sanctuary to spend infinite years;
Eternity would now be my home.
I'd cultivate gardens of forsythia and violets,
Plant olive trees and harvest grains;
Grow apple orchards and grape vineyards,
From their full bounty would I be sustained.
Of lyres and harps there'd come splendid music,
Beautiful children would dance and be gay.
Sadness and crying would never bear witness,
Illness and sorrow would remain far away.
You'd be the first to visit my home,
Sweet child whose earthly life has been taken.
For here you would live and love and be blessed,
With God at your side, your eternal beacon.
1993
Amaurot is the fictional capital of Utopia. I wrote this
poem in memory of a child born with a most
devastating birth defect and died shortly after birth. I
dedicate this poem to all children who have died.
No longer do I fear my death,
For my weakened bodynow reborn,
Will witness every dawn of every morn
That is yet to cast itself upon
The remnants of my past.
And thus the light above me now,
With rays aglow in silent symmetry,
Will forever shine far into that eternity
Where I will be
At peace.
1990
Clothed in winter's vale of lace,
Stands an aged tree.
Awaiting springtime's youthful face,
To birth its hues of green.
Yet here upon this winter eve,
A birth did not await.
A daughter whom from love conceived,
Born pure and delicate.
Her father's hands were first to touch,
This soft and graceful form.
A special being to love so much,
And rejoice with each new morn.
So as the snow drapes on the boughs,
Of olden elms and oaks.
Know well this child of winter now,
Is blessed with spring's new hopes.
1993
After having a pregnancy loss, this mother
conceived. She went into labor at home and did not
have time to get to the hospital. Her husband
delivered his daughter Sydney by himself at home
With caring hands he touches mine,
And tells of my lost dreams.
Melancholy surrounds me.
No longer lives the love
Which I've proclaimed.
No longer lives the dream
My mind has seen as
Misfortune now comes to my
Heart where only Joy should
Rest.
1989
This young women just endured her third consecutive,
unexplained pregnancy loss.
The body in anguish to create,
And the soul, cry out for birth.
Then, you're born; not yet of age
But whole. You cannot speak but your
Cries are heard as your mother
Wipes her tears and smiles.
1989
After many years of infertility and pregnancy
losses, Dawn was born. Her birth was complicated by
premature labor and fetal distress, and she was born
emergently by Cesarean section. She weighed but
four pounds at birth.
Liquor about my child
Entombed,
confined within
My faltered womb
How you betrayed all my
Life's hope.
Yet it is hope
That will befriend and bath
her primal soul
With sweetness to
Eternity's end.
1994
All too often a mother will have a disorder of the
amniotic fluid leading to Perinatal loss. These
unexpected and disastrous events led me to write these
lines.
Summer breezes sway the poplar,
As I walk the banks with my new daughter.
Recalling summers spent in sorrow,
In fear I'll forever walk without her.
But through the seasons of this year,
New hope was born, without that fear;
My body pregnant, filled with life;
No more sadness, no more strife.
And in awe, my eyes did see
Her image as she was born of me;
Ruby cheeks, down-like hair,
Eyes aglow, skin so fair.
Thus I turn to thoughts of Summer,
When breezes blow and sway the poplar
When I walk and talk and look
At my beloved daughter, Brooke.
1990
This mother had multiple pregnancy losses and no
living children. She was at very high risk for another
loss, but delivered Brook, healthy and beautiful.
I have seen the caul
like honey glazed
contain and bathe
in sweet succor,
kept watch as
mother's wombs
tear in pain to
bear their child
and then
as if my first,
stood aside and
cried with awe at
the birth,
that quiescent harbor
where life sings
psalmic verses
of calms and storms
rains and draughts
sun lights and dark nights,
agendas to live on forever.
1993
This states best as I can the overwhelming emotion I feel, day by day as I attend births.
"Until the day of his death,
no man can be sure of his courage"
Jean Anouilh, Becket
He was a being in search of his destiny,
And with abundant virtues and dignities,
He filled his days with endeavors of selfless devotion.
A sage with a love for mankind,
Hecared for the needy with reverence.
Though the sorrow we feel is deep,
We must not share in his suffering, but
Triumph over his death by committing our
Hearts, our bosoms, and our most visceral spirits
To profound purpose.
Yes, stand tall, thy men of courage,
For a leader amongst us has fallen.
With gallant humanism, and valiant resolve,
He leaves our mortal plains and hills of despair
To ascend his mountain peaks of glory.
With his inspirations of vitality and hope,
Everything was beautiful and good.
We lament his short life, yet find comfort that
His mortal being was but "a fleeting gleam"
Between two eternity's of tranquil salvation;
Be comforted; for now, His soul is at rest,
Cradled in peace.
1991
Written for a friend and colleague upon his death.
Beneath their feet the parched leaves crack.
Lifeless, fallen branches fracture.
Wearily fathers hunt and search
To mend the pains of endless thirst.
A mother cradles to her chest,
The newborn child upon her breast,
And while gazing towards the cloudless sky.
Asks why be born if now to die?
Wasted by their arid land,
Children beg with outstretched hand
Their feeble voices impotent,
To cry; A Death-Watch all too silent.
Hunger cries but finds no ears,
None to help their doleful tears.
Impoverished people bearing sorrow.
Starved today; entombed tomorrow.
1993
Andira is a genus of tropical tree found in Africa known as a "rain tree". This poem is written in memory of all children who have died and are dying from the ugliness of starvation.
From Hippocrates
On whom we swore
And Aesculapius
Who thus bore
Hygeia, we now
With dutiful dedication
Somehow
Must manage to transcend
A myriad of extrinsic forces
With one purpose: to mend
The bleeding and the cries
Of our diverse patients' lives.
We birth their children,
Curette their wombs,
Remove their tumors,
And for those whom
Maladies cause pain,
We set upon a course of healing
So that once again
Their being is restored.
But there is much more,
So very much more.
For the primal core
Of what we dedicate
Our time and strength
Is not just to operate,
Or to "stand before" and facilitate
The births of tomorrow's children,
But rather to provide
True counsel;
To advise and to guide
Through the darkest paths
In the deepest forests
Of our patients lives.
For when they face us,
Stare, eye to eye
And mourn their loss
Of health, of parent or of child;
When marriage dissolves into divorce,
And depressive thoughts of suicide
Bring them to us
And us to their bedside,
We must be skilled with more
Than laser or with knife.
We must be filled
With integrity and
compassion,
The moral virtues
of our life,
And bring to the ill
Comfort, sympathy and
hope.
1993
The Asclepidae was the Greek Priest-Physician family of which Hippocrates was a member physician and surgeon. This is written as a plea for those medical students and residents who have chosen Obstetrics and Gynecology as their profession.
My face droops, chiseled
with furrows of sadness.
Eden is no longer.
Trust teeters
tenuously in anonymity.
Ignorance,
Poverty,
Desperation,
Cohabit; irrational and violent.
Sickness lusts. Death waits.
I tremble
Yet, steadfastly will I climb,
season to season,
for a lifetime,
amidst tendril roots and ragged
crevices,
in search of reason,
and when weary and my flesh aches, and
heart hypoxic hungrily palpitates,
my sight dims
and body falls painfully sick,
I'll travel obscure atmospheres
glancing back to see
past images appear
of life's fine threads and
loves unspooled, with
unimagined clarity
and pause, alone
upon the threshold
of my empyrean home,
and whisper prayerful
thoughts
to heal my wounded soul.
1993
Despite anguish, pessimism and opprressions , there can be discovered wonderment and hopeful optimism throughout the course of our lives.
The first song on earth
Was a child's cry,
A canticle of absolute beauty.
Each note a bequest for eternity; Ageless
music of heartsounds
And first-breath sighs
To immortalize
The promise of humankind.
1993
Aoide is the Greek Muse of Song. These lines are a dedication to the labor and delivery suite of Yale- New Haven Hospital where I practice.
July, 2012
Respice, et Prospice
Look backward and forward (l)
Passion remains, privilege endures,
while life and lifeless,
each lifted by my hands, coexist.
On journey long, journey full,
with origins beneath golden skies,
I strive to heal, diminish fear;
making real, priceless promises of life each day.
And yearnfor it is not time
to reach the edge where breath beats
and heart sighs succumb,
still from imagination and contribution
nor where dreams drop to stagnant pools,
ripple towards silted banks then disappear
into crevices carved by debris
and rain and all things natural.
Not time to leave visions
of reformation, reclamation;
to leave pathways lit by opportunity
covered with vines of spirit
and climbs of renewal.
But a time of great hope.
Hope to affect lives, teach tenets,
create paradigms; counsel, care, mentor,
affirm a promise; a fate perhaps
as fortitude, my foundation of resolve,
rushes in my blood, every pulse a wave
approaching unfamiliar shores,
mighty and assured.
I will leave love behind
but will not lose it.
It will not fade to vapors
as common as fog
but rather guide me to be proud
of its wondrous years of caring and of healing;
years that turn now not to clouds but to earth,
To root something once unimaginable:
to marvel again and again
and by word and deed,
to create and bond
what means and brings for all, good life...
...a good birth and beyond.
There is a need to instill a sense of how important our influence and presence is to our patients when they experience their losses. As physicians, we must formulate an approach which will permit us to provide our patients the comfort and hope they require and should expect from us. I believe we must grasp and understand our own feelings to better serve our patients: we must serve our patients though both science and humanism. By becoming more introspective and more emotionally involved in what we are doing, our compassion will become evident and our patients will benefit. Technology indeed provides better diagnostic and therapeutic medical care, but as more technology is developed and utilized, health professionals may become more reliant on that technology and less on their interpersonal skills. They will have to learn or relearn- and practice the traditional art of medicine, of listening and talking to patients, holding their hands, being at their bed side, while complementing the use of modern technology and advanced science. We as physicians must assure that the benefits of these technologies are fully realized but that their expanding sphere of influence does not disenfranchise the patient nor de-personalize the physician-patient relationship.
Inherent in what defines the physician-patient partnership is an unfaltering responsibility of the physician and an unconditional trust of the physician by the patient. Together these bond the chasm between the vulnerable patient and the knowledge and experience of the physician; a synergy of the need for care and the privilege of caring. I believe the medical professional at all levels must step back from each moment in his/her patient care routine, and reflect on what he or she is doing, why it is being done and what influence it is having on their patients lives. This self-reflection is integral to professionalism for it encourages the formation of a philosophy of care and ethic of practice, which in turns fosters self-examination and meaning, empathy and compassion.