Surgical Consult by George Bascom

 $Unique_ID{AST00207}

$Title{Surgical Consult}

$Author{Bascom, George S., M.D.}

$Subject{poetry}

$Journal{}

$Volume{}

$Date{1982}

$Log{}

                                 LATE ASTERS

                              Surgical Consult

With vigor and technology

I have intervened

In countless lives.

That is my job.

My calling is to know

When things have gone awry

And then to throw the weight

Of all I know, all command,

Down on the side of life.

So I have intervened

And, by and large, successfully.

But sometimes, choosing wrong,

I set that weight

Upon the side of dissolution.

Then beleaguered lives have had my choice to bear

Along with all the other ballast

Dragging down.

I recall tonight

With all the vividness of color slides

A frightful catalogue of failure:

Fecal smelling wounds,

Grey black tissue,

Bleeding uncontrolled,

Pallor,

Stupor,

Death.

And tidal waves of anguish

Out of wounded families.

This is the weight I feel upon my hand

As I reach out again

To intervene.