Five Years

a poem

Dear Dr. C–

You were wrong.

I wasn’t a problem. You were.

I wasn’t going through normal symptoms for a mom of 4.

My organs ruptured into a kind of marriage I’d never imagined, a tunnel uniting them together.

You should’ve known. You should’ve cared. You caused this, when you closed your door.

Empty. Hopeless. Broken.

Alone.

Why–

did you tell me that I wasn’t your problem? did you tell me nothing was wrong?

The urologist told you I had a hole, the size of a fifty-cent piece.

“Huh.”

You could’ve said you were sorry.

You said “huh.”

Broken. Humiliated. Empty.

Alone.

I think about you when I want the world to be a better place. I cry when I think of the others you left broken too.

It’s been five years, and I can’t forget you.

You probably don’t remember me. But I remember you.

One day, you’ll remember the patients you sent home broken. You’ll remember them as you write them each an apology. You’ll remember them on the days you put them through trauma.

You’ll remember them forever, but they’ll forget you.