Second Day as a Surgery Student
“There must be a better way to make a living than this!” / Slam. / Silence, except for the persistent heartbeat. / The beat of the ticking time bomb, the dying heart.
Off the Shelf
Off the Shelf is our section for creative works by medical students.
Managing Editor Emeritus
Penn State Hershey College of Medicine
Lexy is a medical student at Penn State Hershey College of Medicine, where she serves as the Class of 2018 secretary and helps at the free clinic, LionCare. She completed her undergraduate degree and her Masters in Public Health at Yale University. At Yale, she played varsity field hockey, served as a freshman counselor in Branford College, and worked for the Global Health Leadership Institute. In the future, she plans to be a general surgeon in the Army and to continue her work in international health and social justice.
One Tough Cookie
This path has been far from cookie cutter, / From being kneaded and rolled / By demanding needs to fulfill multiple roles, / I can’t help but wonder, will I make the cut?
On Performing Medicine
I feel like a child wearing his father’s coat / The starched, fabric seems like a costume
The Paratrooper
The paratrooper shook as they descended upon him. / Prepared to interrogate him with hollow-point questions
Passive Activism
We strive to identify as a generation of idealists. / We are politically aware, socially conscious young adults. / We place our collective purchasing power behind products with a social mission.
21st Century Infectious Disease (2017)
Modern art for today’s diseases. It’s up to us to find tomorrow’s solutions.
Rosie
I first heard the click, click of her black stilettos / Her heels narrowed to a tiny point that seemed to pierce the ground. / I imagined the floor whimpering at every step she took / The faces of terrified tiles reflecting in glistening heels
The Playbook
In the playbook of professionalism, / Where is room for the physician who / Reads German poetry to the dying patient / For days and days until her end?
Reflection Through Mask-Making
On a December night in a northern suburb of Chicago, the weather outside dipped into single digits with a sub-zero wind-chill. Safely situated indoors, a group of medical students wandered into a classroom where five tables were covered by plastic tarps with another laden with pipe cleaners, acrylic paint and brushes, and a stack of blank masks. Licking the emotional wounds left by a sleep-deprived exam week that ended only three days prior, the students eyed the art supplies. They were hopeful for a means for reconcile their psyche tattered by cold and a semester of school.
Please Not Me
“Please not me,” I pray earnestly. Not me. Not me. I don’t want to become the medical student-turned-resident-turned-physician who loses empathy. The one who loses compassion. The one who takes lives and near death experiences for granted, who quickly learns, as an ER attending once bluntly stated, that “everyone’s a liar.” Not me.
Anatomy as Art: Installation #20
At Albany Medical College, upon our orientation to gross anatomy, we are asked to draw our feelings on blank index cards prior to entering the cadaver laboratory. As we progress through the year, our sentiments regarding anatomy may remain the same, or may change, and these drawings allow us to look back at this milestone we crossed as budding medical students.
Take Care
The mother looks at the doctor / and back at me. / The baby smiles. / She says, / “She won’t keep her food down.”
Contributing Writer
Drexel University College of Medicine
Candice is a student of Drexel University College of Medicine Class of 2019. Her passions lie in writing poetry, discussing racial and gender inequities, learning calligraphy, and living vicariously through TV shows. She hopes to one day work within the realm of reproductive justice and write 100 poems before graduating medical school.