American Life in Poetry

I remember being scared to death when, at about 30 years of age, I saw an X-ray of my skull.

Seeing one’s self as a skeleton – or receiving any kind of medical report, even when the news is good – can be unsettling. Suddenly, you’re just another body, a clock waiting to stop.

Here’s a telling poem by Rick Campbell, who lives and teaches in Florida.

Heart

My heart was suspect.

Wired to an EKG,

I walked a treadmill

that measured my ebb

and flow, tracked isotopes

that ploughed my veins,

looked for a constancy

I’ve hardly ever found.

For a month I worried

as I climbed the stairs

to my office. The mortality

I never believed in

was here now. They

say my heart’s ok,

just high cholesterol, but

I know my heart’s a house

someone has broken into,

a room you come back

to and know some stranger

with bad intent has been there

and touched all that you love. You know

he can come back. It’s his call,

his house now.