-
Annotated by:
- Kohn, Martin
- Date of entry: Aug-14-2018
- Last revised: Jan-02-2019
Summary
In this volume
by the esteemed nurse-poet/writer, Cortney Davis, are 43 previously
published poems (some revised for this collection), assembled in 3
sections-- the middle section featuring her long poem, "Becoming the
Patient," that recounts through 10 shorter poems her time "in the
hospital."
The poems in the surrounding sections describe in beautiful and intimate detail her patients' lives and the call to and practice of nursing. Featured throughout are battles won and lost-- with disease, with the medical staff, and as the title-- taking care of time-- suggests, the finitude we all face. No matter the difficulties of hospital life-- whether as practitioner or patient-- its familiarity provides grounding and comfort in these poems as, for example, heard through the speaker of "First Night at the Cheap Hotel" who tells us:
And if sometimes the experiences and images become too hard to bear, the skillful nurse-poet can, as Cortney Davis does in "On-Call: Splenectomy," "tame them on page” (p.52).
The poems in the surrounding sections describe in beautiful and intimate detail her patients' lives and the call to and practice of nursing. Featured throughout are battles won and lost-- with disease, with the medical staff, and as the title-- taking care of time-- suggests, the finitude we all face. No matter the difficulties of hospital life-- whether as practitioner or patient-- its familiarity provides grounding and comfort in these poems as, for example, heard through the speaker of "First Night at the Cheap Hotel" who tells us:
"Being here is like being sick in a hospital ward
without the lovely, muffling glove of illness.
In hospital, I would be drowsy, drugged into a calm
that accepts the metal door's clang,
the heavy footfall right outside my door.
All these, proof of life,
and there would be a nurse too, holding my wrist,
counting and nodding, only a silhouette in the dark" (p.67)
And if sometimes the experiences and images become too hard to bear, the skillful nurse-poet can, as Cortney Davis does in "On-Call: Splenectomy," "tame them on page” (p.52).
Miscellaneous
First place in the 2018 American Journal of Nursing Book of the Year Awards in the category of Creative Works.
Primary Source
Michigan State University Press
Publisher
Wheelbarrow Books
Place Published
East Lansing Michigan
Edition
1st edition (March 1, 2018)
Page Count
70 pages
Commentary