I should know what to do,
I should know what to say,
I studied so I should know how this is going to go,
That’s the worst part, the fact that I know,
I must not forget that, “I tread with care in matters of life and death. If it is given to me to save a life, all thanks. But it may also be within my power to take a life; this awesome responsibility must be faced with great humbleness and awareness of my own frailty. Above all, I must not play at God.”
I could be cool and detached,
I could do a report and send it to the CDC,
I could forget her name and maker just another number,
But even if I try,
“I will remember that I do not treat a fever chart, a cancerous growth, but a sick human being, whose illness may affect the person’s family and economic stability. My responsibility includes these related problems, if I am to care adequately for the sick.”
She will be crushed,
She will cry and wail,
And when she walks out of this room,
I would like her to know,
That at the very least “I will remember that I remain a member of society, with special obligations to all my fellow human beings, those sound of mind and body as well as the infirm.”
At the school they tell you what to say,
But they cannot prepare you for the shock,
For the why me?
The paralyzing awareness that…
That you can only do so much,
“I will remember that there is art to medicine as well as science, and that warmth, sympathy, and understanding may outweigh the surgeon’s knife or the chemist’s drug.”
…………………………. Amare Poeta
Outside my mind 