I write poetry to process the experiences - both painful and joyful - in my patients' lives and my own. I never explicitly set out to do it. There's no conscious intention, no I'm going to write about poem about this to help me feel better. But almost inevitably, the words find their way to the …

Continue reading A Year in Poetry

I didn't expect to love running into people so much. When we moved into our house (from a condo and multiple apartments before that), I vaguely noted that, for the the first time, we would have actual neighbors. Sure, we had had upstairs and downstairs and across-the-hall neighbors for years, and depending on the setting …

Continue reading Talking About Death on the Sidewalk on a Saturday

For me, it's a circular motion with my right foot. Moving only from the ankle, it swivels around and around, my pointed toe tracing a counterclockwise path through the air. This is my anxious habit. I knew for years that I did it, but I had considered it an innocent, idle movement of no significance. …

Continue reading Stillness