Swallowed Up
By Catharine Clark-Sayles
The table slips into the machine – I close my eyes, as usual –
imagine scenes to match the banging—today no steel drums,
no Jamaican breeze, no Scotty warning Kirk “She canna take much more”.
The giant space woodpeckers are put to sleep by the recorded drone
“Deep breath, hold it,” bang, bangbang—until I think I cannot last,
then” Breathe.” as I gulp air, prepare for another round
of” Breathe and hold.” My shoulders try to climb my ears—
turtle defense against dangers unknown. I think of Tonia,
coaxing muscles to untie and I try to loose the tension
but they crawl up again as soon as the banging begins
and an itch twitches through my nose, my arm chills as the dye flows in.
We begin again. I need an angel to stand by with a hand
on my head for strength but I wonder if angel feathers
are metallic and what happens to an angel in the magnetic maw
which, even now, seems to consider swallowing me whole.
I imagine explosions of feathers flying through the room.
Would the stone-faced technician notice? The one who shook her head
when I tried to explain I was lying whopper-jawed. Sideways
she understood, impatient as I pulled my gown out of its bunch
and considered the panic button in my hand—placebo?
Drop the shoulders before they knot. Then silence so long I had time
to remember Burgess Meredith forgotten in a library while the world
went away. The last man in the world in book-lover heaven.
Then a stumble and broken glasses—that Twilight Zone twist.
My glasses are in a box somewhere outside of this room.
Will I need them entombed like some Egyptian mummy walled alive?
The machine rolls out its tongue, presents me like gristle,
thoroughly chewed. I scratch my nose and shuffle out, hold up
the slipping trousers, taking Burgess and the Mummy
and a balding angel home to wait.
Catharine Clark-Sayles is a physician who recently retired after forty years in practice. She completed her MFA in poetry and narrative medicine at Dominican University of California in 2019. Her first two books of poetry, One Breath and Lifeboat, were published by Tebot Bach Press. A chapbook, Brats, was published by Finishing Line Press. Her fourth book, The Telling, The Listening, was published by Saint Julian Press in October 2023.
Mammogram
By Julia Fleeman
Breast pressed like a flower,
hold your breath for the exposure,
then hold it for the results.
Down the hall to Ultrasound,
the cool gel, the smooth wand.
A good result: fluid, not flesh.
Float lightly through the waiting room
on the way out
past a woman whispering into a cell phone,
“I’m so afraid.”
Julia Fleeman lives in Phoenix. Her work has appeared in Triplopia, Tilt-A-Whirl, Truck, Your Daily Poem, and Write On, Downtown.
Last Words
By Ruth Franks Snedecor
No one ever asked me to hold your last words.
I knew I could possibly be the attendant to your last breath.
I knew I might be the caretaker to your last heartbeat.
It comes with the job.
But last words—
those are for priests on death beds,
for confessions of old sins,
for loved ones on whispered breaths,
for resolutions of young mistakes.
No one told me I had to hold your last words.
They are not mine to hear.
They are not mine to know.
They are too much to carry in my heart.
Your last words don’t belong to my ears,
or to my head to recall.
No one prepared me to hold your last words.
It was my own deafening realization when you died
that I had heard your last words, so scared and huge.
I didn’t tell those you loved your last words
because it would shatter them too.
So I kept them just to myself.
No one cautioned me that I was to be the keeper of your last words
and how lonely that would be.
Dr. Ruth Franks Snedecor was born and raised in Lake Havasu City, AZ and attended U of A Tucson for her undergraduate and doctorate education, thus, a devoted Wildcat. She is board- certified in internal medicine and has been practicing as an academic hospitalist at Banner-University Medical Center-Phoenix for over 16 years.
As an Associate Program Director for the University of Arizona College of Medicine-Phoenix (UA-COMP) Internal Medicine Residency, she is passionate about patient safety and quality improvement and works to find new and creative ways to integrate these concepts into the residents’ educations.
Nationally recognized by the Alliance of Internal Medicine and Society of Hospital Medicine (SHM) for her work in these areas, she also serves on the faculty for Quality and Safety Educators Academy through SHM. She is the Patient Safety Physician Lead for her home institution and director of Sub-Internships and Electives for 3rd and 4th year students at UA-COMP, where she loves helping students find their place in medicine. A Phoenix Magazine “Toc Doc,” this busy wife and mom of 3 (ages 16, 13, and 11yo) can often be found on a mountain/exploring Arizona with her family or penning prose about her experiences in medicine.