Attending

 

He loses every case — it’s hospice, he knows.

But isn’t medicine supposed to mean

saving people, healing them, saying no

to death? The right technique, the right machine,

the right dose of pills — isn’t that what a doctor

should know? Coax fire from the spark of life —

is that what doctors do? Yet no one walks

out of here. Nothing gets fixed with a knife.

They’re all goners here. Every one. So when

did doctor stop meaning teacher — is that

where we went wrong? Best to call him attending

physician — here to bear witness. What

else can the white coat mean, if not surrender —

tending what is broken, what is not.

 

                                                       for Derek Kerr

 

 

© Michael Fleming

Brattleboro, Vermont

April 2013

 

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