Poetry by Kelley Jean White: Desertion, Dessert, Nineteen, Oversight, Zen

Home Summer 2009 Spring 2009 Autumn 2008 Summer 2008 Spring/Summer 2008 Winter/Spring 2008 Autumn 2007 Summer 2007 Spring 2007 Winter 2007 Autumn 2006 Summer 2006 Spring 2006 Winter 2006 Fall 2005 Summer 2005 Editor's Note Guidelines SNR's Writers Contact	Desertion So much invasion, and so little to see– in a moment you might put on your hat, toss your newspaper into the fireplace, empty your waterbottle into the sink. You might abandon even the remote control. Take your shirt from the back of the chair at the head of the table. Pack your dictionary. So little to take with you. Nothing of use to leave behind. The empty room full of your need to be heard.
	Dessert two what one said to the other knives in the dish drainer crossed yesterday’s ashes on his empty hands a flame that echoed white her face lace a brittle dance table torn and carved cloth on the edge of the stairs
	Nineteen lives in a typical guy house refrigerator with nothing but condiments and a Chinese food carton age and origin unknown conversation revolves around beer and the deeper philosophical questions he keeps a double mattress on the floor with a single pokemon sheets stretched to a diagonal near fit and a very old pacman pillow the entertainment center is state of the art
	Oversight Mother presents with request for utility form completion Physician aware Records clerk brings chart to physician for review Chart documents poorly controlled asthma MD requests that parent wait while MD completes exam of scheduled patient Mother expresses anger at medical records clerk Attempts to follow clerk into medical record room Physician aware MD repeats request that parent wait while MD completes exam of sick child Mother threatens clerk with bodily harm Staff request clinic manager dial 911 Physician aware MD requests mother wait until care of current patient is completed Clinic manager escorts parent to an exam room Mother co-operative with physician as form is completed Staff requests improved security protocol Mother fails to bring asthmatic child to office for care as requested by physician Union grievance filed against manager by clinical staff for failure to dial 911
	Zen I was the medical student on orthopedic surgery. It was a big case: neurosurgery, orthopedics and pediatric surgery all involved; a child with myelomeningocele, respiratory compromise secondary to worsening scoliosis. He lay on his left side. One group was to enter the chest, one the back, one the abdomen. The first incisions were made by general surgery (the abdomen) and ortho (the back) then anesthesia spoke: dropping pressures, irregular rhythm, flat line flat line transfuse shock shock. Bill Jo, left-handed, four foot ten, stood across from me, quiet, good-humored; for four hours he held the heart in his hands, a bag of worms. Pump Pump. Pump. I carried warm saline to lavage the intestines. Neurosurgery never scrubbed. We stood under the hot OR lamps as fall light grayed to black. Bill told quiet jokes in unaccented English. The first board certified Korean American pediatric surgeon. Ortho left. Bill squeezed the heart. Again. Again. Competent. Steady. Gave me a turn. The faintest stirring movement. That bag of worms. Defribulate. Jolt. And it did. On the eleventh try. Sinus rhythm. On rounds the next day the child sat up, CNS fully intact, told us all about kindergarten.

Copyright 2009, Kelley White. © This work is protected under the U.S. copyright laws. It may not be reproduced, reprinted, reused, or altered without the expressed written permission of the author.

Kelley White worked as a pediatrician in inner-city Philadelphia for almost 30 years and now is in practice at a community health center in rural New Hampshire. Poetry has often saved her life. She is a recipient of a 2008 fellowship from the Pennsylvania Council on the Arts, and her most recent book is Toxic Environment from BostonPoet Press.