Poetry
Desensitize Yourself.
Andromeda Clark
A woman is dead across the hall in room 10,
She was a low level trauma, elderly fall on blood thinners.
These things happen.
I am eating lunch at my computer.
Jimmy Johns forgot to not put tomatoes on my sandwich,
These things happen.
Around the corner in room 13,
A young girl, about 16, has found out she has leukemia.
These things happen.
My keyboard is sticking,
Every space takes extra force. Every “E” slams into the desk.
These things happen.
At the nurse’s station a radio pings,
Priority one, head on collision at 60 MPH, a college girl,
intubated and getting CPR.
It is too often that these things happen.
Author: Andromeda Clark
Bio: Andromeda Clark (They/He) is a 5th year premedical student at Saginaw Valley State University in Michigan. They work as a medical scribe in both emergency and neonatal intensive care, and spend their free time writing, reading, and creating multimedia art. He plans to pursue medicine at a Michigan school, and is interested in generalized fields with a focus on rural, international, and under-served community healthcare.
Commentary: I wrote this piece shortly after witnessing a traumatic death while at work and suddenly realizing that it didn't affect me the same way it had two years ago when I started my job. It felt difficult to explain the general numbness I had developed to tragedy to my family, and writing this poem allowed me the space to work through reflecting on how to best discuss what I felt, and how it had become that way.