Tag: loss
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Managing loss and emotional turmoil through poetry
Maria ShopovaDublin, Ireland Loss is a universal human experience that spans borders and cultures. Patients, facing death, may struggle with existential questions and anxiety due to the loss of health. Families bear the agony of watching a loved one deteriorate and die, and then enter a period of grieving. And medical professionals, who are not…
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O Child! My Child!
Alice RanjanRedmond, Washington, USA O Child! My Child!Enter did you, into this world,incarnadine and warm.But when I held you in my arms,you did not shriek or love or scorn.Nay, you took the pathfrom mother’s bloodto River Styxin evanescent breath.How I wish you could have stayed with meto see the world beyond. You will not see…
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Vigil
Terri EricksonPfafftown, North Carolina, United States In a care home in Göteborg, Sweden, my husband’s sister, Jensina, sits vigil at the bedside of their Aunt Astrid, who is dying. She holds her hand, speaks to her as if everything is as it was, the two of them talking in Astrid’s apartment, her sharp mind and…
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On the death of a hospital volunteer
Bonnie Salomon Lake Forest, Illinois, United States Golf course greens were not for you—too quiet. No cruise ships to sail—too boring. Retirement held no enchantment for you. Mask and pills alongside a coffee. Photo by Fawaz.tairou. Via Wikimedia. CC BY-SA 4.0. Instead, you chose us— —the motley ER crew—hardly noticed, gliding through white coats…
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Maimed
Laura Wendorff Platteville, Wisconsin, United States Your friend says, Photo by Laura Wendorff think of the Amazons who cut off their right breasts in order to easily draw back their bows. But the loss is not like that. It’s more like a flower dug out of the ground, soil still clinging to its roots…