Poet and essayist Marianne Boruch illuminates a scene from a “Hospital.” Her poem provides a contrast of what an outsider might experience and the reality of those who work in such a place. She notes that “It seems / as if the end of the world / has never happened in here.” For patients and their loved ones, their worst day, their worst moment, often occurs in the confines of the hospital.
The narrator expects more, a kind of signal, of “smoke” or “dizzy flaring” but instead she waits, watching people go by as if on a conveyor. She sees “them pass, the surgical folk– / nurses, doctors, the guy who hangs up / the blood drop–ready for lunch…” They are going about their day, their work. She catches them at “the end of a joke,” but misses the punch line. Instead, it is lost in “their brief laughter.”
Boruch’s reflection reminds me of Mary Oliver’s lines in Wild Geese: “Tell me about despair, yours, and I will tell you mine. / Meanwhile the world goes on.” Boruch’s poem reveals the dichotomy of a hospital: while some can be devastated, others go about their day, wearing their designated uniform of “a cheerful green or pale blue.”
When I have been a patient, or the loved one waiting for word, the usually familiar hospital is completely transformed from how it exists for me as a physician. Boruch captures these parallel worlds in her poem, and gives the reader space for reflection on their disconnect.
Writing Prompt: Think of the last time you were in a hospital as a patient, as a visitor, as a medical professional. What did you observe? How did your experience differ based on the reason why you were there? Write for 10 minutes.