Lianne Mercer, RN, MSN, and certified poetry therapist, wrote the following poem. She says this patient taught her “…that I need to risk communicating in whatever way I can because communication is the road into healing.”

Bendición

In Room 28, an old woman perches on her bed

stiff with fear. She licks crooked, gold-filled teeth,

spews Spanish words of sorrow that fall like tears.

I hold out my hands like sieves dripping syllables, say

No comprendo. Ah, she makes the sign of the cross.

Her long fingers reach for mine.

She smiles around my tentative use of dolor and las flores,

words spoken on this dusky evening eventual night will

extinguish.

She enriches me – reveals me to myself growing in a dawn

garden

where zinnias reach for the sun with mariachi arms, where

clicking beetles make music far sweeter than excuses of

language

blooming, then fading, in our hands.

I breathe in this gift of recognition

from a bent-over woman whose heart bursts

with words needing no voice, spilling

from her eyes into mine, dancing now

beneath our fingers, affirming that we are kin,

breath of feathers on my arm,

whispers in my soul.

Submitted by John Fox, CPT who says “Poems stir us to wake up. There is aliveness and emotional honesty in poetic language. There are messages and clues in poems about where we have been, where we are and where we might go — not only individually but in our humanity.”

John has helped people find the healing poet who lives within them. He teaches, consults, writes and speaks to individuals, professional groups and organizations across the country and in Europe. His work reaches people in medical, therapeutic, educational, spiritual and artistic fields. It is dedicated to anyone who believes that creative expression is a pathway to healing. You may contact John through his web site at www.poeticmedicine.com or call at 650-400-3345.