Medical Humanities
for an intern on call in houston
for an intern on call in houston
hundreds of black birds going north
toward the mainland
where you in a windowless
I imagine room are waiting
for something to be born
so you can palpate
and percuss it
or some nine-year-old
to come in flushed
and DKA and gone
elsewhere
maybe a boy kingdom
where it rains insulin
and hails pancreases
on hornytoads, popsicles, war toys and bicycles
his eyes roll
it’s a county hospital
how does it feel
to be recognized
by so many
black birds
Deputy Editor's Note
Rachel Pearson is an MD/PhD student, MS4, at the Institute for the Medical Humanities and the University of Texas Medical Branch. Her research interests are in mental illness narratives and the application of findings in neuroscience to broader notions of personhood and humanity. Rachel’s poetry has appeared in The Mid-American Review, the Windward Review, and elsewhere. She is a recipient of the Academy of American Poets Award from the University of Texas at Austin. She is a student scholar in the John P. McGovern Academy for Oslerian Medicine and a member of the Gold Humanism Honor Society.