champagne tap
she is curled on her side like a child / eyes closed, back exposed.
Poetry Thursdays
Poetry Thursdays is our initiative to highlight poetry and prose by medical students, with a new post every Thursday. If you are interested in contributing or would like to learn more, please contact our editors.
Contributing Writer
University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine
Julia is a third year medical student at the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania. She graduated from Georgetown University in 2020 with a major in Health Care Policy. She loves curating oddly specific Spotify playlists, going to concerts, and keeping up her NYT crossword puzzle streak. Julia hopes to pursue a career in surgery.
Dying Is Not
Dying is not / as romantic as I once thought. / I think you always knew this.
More Than Skin Deep
Our successes are born out of / The communities that uplifted us. / The teachers that pushed us.
Choreiform Tango
The intruder slithers in at midnight, / slinking his way to the boy fast asleep, / the tangled mess of hospital wires his field of untrimmed grass,
Operating Room
As I step carefully into the sterile field / past the rows of scalpels, forceps and clamps, / I sense a gentle fluttering in my chest.
Caduceus
Should the symbol of medicine bear one snake or two? / If you answered two, then the joke is on you! / Or, at least, that’s the current popular view.
Trauma Shift
I imagine her mother / Squeezing daughter’s limp hand / Silent tears
Anatomy: A Cadaveric Poem
Anatomy is more than flesh and bone and blood. / It’s more than the donor and the scalpel teaching the student.
HPI
good morning, i’m the medical student / i must ask how you are feeling / even though my eyes already sting
Borborygmi
Borborygmi: Rumbling or gurgling noises made by the movement of fluid and gas in the intestines.
Scan to Scan
A fog of emotions blankets the waiting room / Stress and anxiety, with some impending doom.
Divinity
There is a straight line from / ordering an ultrasound to obtaining / clear cylinders of red blood cells.
Contributing Writer
Harvard Medical School
Ellen Zhang is a Harvard Medical Student who is passionate about using writing as a lens to unravel the complexity of medicine, enhance empathy, and provide humanistic care. She enjoys hiking, baking, and exploring local cafes.