CMAJ • August 12, 2008; 179 (4). doi:10.1503/cmaj.071895.
© 2008 Canadian Medical Association or its licensors
All editorial matter in CMAJ represents the opinions of the authors and not necessarily those of the Canadian Medical Association.
This Article
Right arrow Full Text (PDF)
Right arrow Submit a response
Right arrow Alert me when this article is cited
Right arrow Alert me when eLetters are posted
Right arrow Alert me if a correction is posted
Services
Right arrow Email this article to a friend
Right arrow Similar articles in this journal
Right arrow Alert me to new issues of the journal
Right arrow Download to citation manager
Google Scholar
Right arrow Articles by Neilson, S.
PubMed
Right arrow Articles by Neilson, S., MD

Poem

Hearts and minds

Shane Neilson, MD

Family Physician, Guelph, Ont.

Lost keys: the thousandth time. I check your pockets,
the truck, wallet, walkway, yesterday's clothes.
Hours of this, hours of me turning your pockets
inside out, of retracing the day you can't remember,
a strange kind of refusal. I wear my best graveclothes
in search of your heart, which strains against
what the doctor in his little room says is heart failure,
and your brain, which we can see is a struggle
for keys. And you always look like I can unlock,
You always find them, you say. I curse
you for the thousandth time, forced to tie a stick
to the keys in a trick I learned from a gas station;
and my love is a big stick, is a battery of tests,
is the track of your mind thirty years ago,
is finding the key in the oven, or propping up
the tippy kitchen table, or in the tub as a float toy
for my daughter, and your refusal that it ever
could have been there, I found it.





This Article
Right arrow Full Text (PDF)
Right arrow Submit a response
Right arrow Alert me when this article is cited
Right arrow Alert me when eLetters are posted
Right arrow Alert me if a correction is posted
Services
Right arrow Email this article to a friend
Right arrow Similar articles in this journal
Right arrow Alert me to new issues of the journal
Right arrow Download to citation manager
Google Scholar
Right arrow Articles by Neilson, S.
PubMed
Right arrow Articles by Neilson, S., MD