i’m not a doctor but i am a very good liar,
and i can pull a needle through skin
if i want to, and i can ask you where
it hurts and you
can say ‘right here’ and
i will care about that.
.
i ask you where it hurts
and you reveal lines from your temple to
the vacancy of your open throat,
and your fingers stumble at every gap
between your ribcage and you ask me
if i can feel it.
your lungs push out used air like a janitor
mops a dirty floor, and i nod.
.
i find room between my arms
and my chest and call it yours.
i fix my ear to your chest
like a stethoscope and listen for the
aching.
.
when i started hearing voices
i wondered why i couldn’t fix them,
and you still inhabited the right side
of my body every night
as you tried to soothe me
with the comatose words
that you called ‘real,’
and so i wondered
if this was pain.
.
i wondered if pain had to be felt
in the back of the throat to be real,
if you could be well of body
but ill of self,
and if i could die before my body did.
.
you asked me where it hurt
and i said everywhere.
i looked for a place to point
but couldn’t find one.
i pointed to you and to the corner
of the room where spirits stood,
to the places where dismembered words
hung like oxygen masks
in the event of an emergency.
i told you about the voices
that you couldn’t hear, told you
that they were sick.
.
‘you are not a doctor,’
you whispered. ‘ and you cannot save
what is not there.’
and so i pressed my face to yours,
closed my eyes and tried
to hear what was in your head
and what the silence must be like
without a dozen voices
and hands that work like heart-monitors
that worry about your breath,
and i am not a doctor
but i am hurt
and i am sick
and i am trying to heal
and save
and listen.
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139,452 Literary Works • 672,565 Reviews
Hi, Storyweaver! this poem was so totally amazing, really. i don't even feel qualified enough to review this piece. This was a brilliant poem bassed on a useful topic. the greatest combination ever- no kidding.
"i wondered if pain had to be felt
in the back of the throat to be real,
if you could be well of body
but ill of self,
and if i could die before my body did. "
Overall: i loved your poem and sincerely hope to read more of your work.
- Anshira; Ink Force
Hi StoryWeaver. I'm Griff, here to review this lovely work.
I just...wow. I can't even...I'm speechless, really. This is amazing. Truly fantastic.
I love the metaphor about the doctors and what pain really is. The beginning drew me right in, I read,
And I pressed the 'like' button right then and there. That stanza right there deserves an award.
My favorite line has to be
I love that so much. It is a question we all ask ourselves at one time or another. When do we stop being alive and become an empty shell? Gah, I can't even...this is so fantastic. I also adore the stanza about how the main character can't pinpoint where the pain is coming from, so he points to everything he can't understand. Love it.
I also enjoyed how the lines were short, but not too short. They moved the story along but made you think hard about every detail. I can tell that you put effort into every line on this page.
The only thing that confused me was the point of view. It was always directed at "you", but I was confused as to who that was. I'm not sure if that was your point, as it is about a person slowly going mad, but that bothered me a bit. Not enough to suppress the genius of this work, though. Not even close!
Overall, I think this is one of my favorite works I have ever read on this site. Wow. And I have seen a lot. This is fantastic. Sorry that I keep saying that, but you did an amazing job. *runs off to read more of your works*
Please keep writing!
~GC
Thank you! Yeah, this was originally written from me to my best friend/boyfriend as a means of venting, so I understand that the "you" isn't likely clear. I appreciate your feedback and might tweak the way it's written just a tad.
Alright, great.
I understand how writing can help. No problem!
Hey there! Dragon here. This is a great poem, though I must admit it seemed to confused me. Asides from a few errors such as lowercase i's and using '' instead of "" for dialogue within your poem, I find that maybe to me it didn't flow constantly, not like a poem. I have to ask though, if he is not a doctor, than what is he? Because he certainly sounds like a doctor... I understood the part about his mental illness and quite enjoyed that part, but the rest didn't seem to flow right. Well I think that tis all for now, good job and keep it up friend:{P
Let's get the nit-pick out of the way: Every 'i' in this piece should be a capital letter when it's on its own.
'and I am not a doctor' for example.
Ok, moving on.
I was intrigued by the topic of this piece and I'm glad I read it. From the opening line, you had my attention, because not only could I relate to what you were saying, you had presented it in a voice that was simple, but effective. This tone continues throughout the duration of the piece.
My favourite line:
'if you could be well of body
but ill of self,'
I would hate to think that you have been mentally ill in some way.
But the startling accuracy of this piece leads me to believe that you have had some experience with it.
Either way: brilliant piece.
Hello StoryWeaver13,
I am here to write you a review. I just finished reading your poem of reality and health, Sickness, which by the way, was well-written. I thought that it was written in deep thought. I just have a few questions to ask you about your poem. Firstly, did you deliberately keep the first letter of each line uncapitalized? Most of the time, poets keep the capitalization and punctuation uniform. But it often depends on the author/writer/poet whether or not they will add punctuation in some places and use apostrophes to change the grammar in words like "'tis" and "o'er". Anyway, even though you might not capitalize the first sentence, did you forget to capitalize the word "I" or was that actually deliberate. The lines are kind of choppy and they don't flow as swiftly. I am not sure if you wanted it that way, but I would suggest making the sentence fragments of each line more fluent. Other than those few things, I think that you have a pretty good poem. Hope to hear more of your writing.
- Magenta
P.S. If you have time, could you please review my poem, Mirage, I could really use the help. Thanks!
I would love to review! And thank you for yours.
Glad to help. Hope you have a great New Year!