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.
Tag: poetry
Contributing Writer
Herbert Wertheim College of Medicine at Florida International University
Joseph Burns is a member of the Class of 2019 at the Herbert Wertheim College of Medicine at Florida International University in Miami, FL. He is a native of Orlando, FL and is an alumnus of Stetson University. He is passionate about the arts and community engagement, having served as the Art Director of the Mammography Art Initiative and the Community Service Chair for the Panther Learning Communities. His interests include congenital heart disease and American Indian Health. He hopes to pursue a career in pediatric cardiology.
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
Med Student Mom
After a day of screams and sorrow and blood, / Every drop of my compassion leached from me. / Racing home to beat the dawn…
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?
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.
Take Care
The mother looks at the doctor / and back at me. / The baby smiles. / She says, / “She won’t keep her food down.”
The Impostor
Here I am, one week from Match — / Decisions that come with a catch. / I know not who I’ll be quite soon / Nor where I’ll be to play in tune.
Amazing Grace
When you look at their white coats / Do you see what I see? / Do you see future doctors / Who are struggling to be
πάθος (pathos)
in path lab / the residents / pass around organs / and explain
Voices in the Clinic Room
What happened to his smile? / Minutes ago, he was beaming. / Now the patient’s face contorted as he yelled. / Fury filled every crevice and crack of his face.
Thanksgiving
I found such peace in our stillness. / Your stomach rumblings almost music. / I caught myself peeking ever so often, / to find solace in your breathing.
Dotting I’s
For the smaller challenges of medicine, like fitting an entire person’s pertinent medical status in the half-inch gap between names on the patient list.
Columnist
A Chicago Medical School
Kate Bock has been writing since she was five years old. She considers "DW Goes to the Beach" to be her finest accomplishment, rendered in marker, green construction paper, and stickers. She studied fiction writing at Northwestern University, where she led a small group of poets called The Slam Society. She studies medicine as an M3 at a Chicago medical school.
Review of Systems
Medical students’ place in the hierarchy of medicine means we are routinely restricted in what we can (or should) say. That taboo list includes our own transformation–despite being only one of thousands impacted by medical education, all too often we are left alone to process how it changes us. Review of Systems is a series of down-to-earth slam poems by Kate Bock, putting words to the unspoken process not just of learning medicine, but of becoming a doctor.
