Medical Humanities
Heart Attack
Mara Feingold-Link
August 18, 2015
Conch shell lies face down
in wet sand. Hard,
like clenched fist,
its flaccid contents
rotted or consumed.
Glossed with modest pink,
an unfurling lip reveals
a coiled chamber,
filled with echoes of
crashing waves.
Faint murmur
when short breath blows
through. A spiral tunnel
rises like stone to mark
this creature’s grave.
Siphonal canal, once meant
for the flow of pearly salt
from ocean swells,
ends now as lifeless petal,
barely bloomed.
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