Those Who Ask

Rowan Magnuson

I drive home with someone else’s pulse on my wrist—

sharpied between surgical gloves and sanitizing 

what I tell my wife about my day.

I speak past the last words on my lips,

too ugly and unkind to share with those who ask—

profanity and purulence

and a gargle I can’t replicate even though I worry

one day I will.

Is it too much to tell you that I tried?

Is it too much to tell you that I spend my red lights 

feeling how air moves through trachea 

and teeth, imagining a life cracked 

and crepitant—

The highway’s doe raises her head 

from tire-torn throat to tell me I’m not doing it right.

You’re missing that strain of pain, she says

It won’t work if it isn’t yours.

Streetlamps become stars and I don’t mind 

because sometimes

they turn off.

Their cervine matriarch lies

beneath two lights telling me 

I could make it mine. I could make it

beautiful and red and keep

that too from those who ask. 

Who, if not me, will carry your heart on their hand? 

Who, if not me, sees what ink-black beats you bear? 

I’ve trained for this. I’ve learned

someone did not treat her right, someone

left dew-wet fur strewn 

between white lines and wreck reports and I 

take her with me too.

Rowan Magnuson is a graduate of Smith College's English program and a first-year medical student. This piece won third place at the 21st Annual Gerald F. Berlin Prize for Creative Writing. Their writing has been recently recognized by the Center for The History of Family Medicine's Student and Resident Essay Contest, The Pharos Poetry Prize, the Helen H. Glaser Student Essay Award, and the Gerald F. Berlin Creative Writing Prize. They are interested in the many intersections of language and medicine and hope to continue exploring both paths here at UMass Chan.