Alive, Alone
By Sara Parke
Editor’s note: In her time in a neonatal Intensive care unit, medical student Sara Parke encountered a premature infant with congenital abnormalities. The girl’s young mother requested that the baby be resuscitated, then abandoned her to the care of the state. Parke, who describes herself as “intrigued by the ways in which creative projects can help with healing and prevent physician burnout,” captured her reaction in a poem. The title is a reference to Emily Dickinson’s “I Have a Bird in Spring,” the last line a nod to Dickinson’s poem “Hope.” Parke, a second-year medical student, is from Littleton, Colo. She received a BA in human biology from Stanford University and studied bioethics on a Fulbright Scholarship.
Bird in Spring
Amanda,
I whisper her name
From Latin:
one worthy of love
She hears me.
Two babyblues flicker
open / shut / o p e n
Alive. Alone
(I feel the weight of it)
Whose face will interpret mine?
Whose eye will hold me light and near?
Whose mouth will taste my honeyed tear?
Don’t worry, baby —
Out here, we are all alone.
• • •
The vernix of an early labor
lingers on translucent skin
skiff of ice, scarlet grooves
Behind a blue mask
[nitrile-embrace]
tender coos
fall like s
n
o
w
flakes
warm and safe
Hope is a thing with feathers.
