Hektoen International

A Journal of Medical Humanities

Pathology

Eden Almasude
Minneapolis, Minnesota, United States

Sipping Scotch and watching fava beans
Spurt new life from the earth
I ruminate:
a dead man’s ribcage, mutilated
The skin of his scalp,
Limp without a skull beneath
for: science and medicine?
Or curiosity?
I smell the morgue
In sweat from my run and wonder
how he can rest in peace
when his lungs are sliced,
his brain in a bucket,
tissue ready to be stained.
Hematoxylin & eosin,
pink and purple
give you cause of death,
and show nothing of his life


EDEN ALMASUDE, is a 4th year medical student and future psychiatrist. She began writing poetry during clerkships to express the complex, painful, and beautiful moments that words often struggle to capture.

Spring 2018

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