Login
|
Join PoetrySoup
Home
Submit Poems
Login
Sign Up
Member Home
My Poems
My Quotes
My Profile & Settings
My Inboxes
My Outboxes
Soup Mail
Contest Results/Status
Contests
Poems
Poets
Famous Poems
Famous Poets
Dictionary
Types of Poems
Videos
Resources
Syllable Counter
Articles
Forum
Blogs
Poem of the Day
New Poems
Anthology
Grammar Check
Greeting Card Maker
Classifieds
Quotes
Short Stories
Member Area
Member Home
My Profile and Settings
My Poems
My Quotes
My Short Stories
My Articles
My Comments Inboxes
My Comments Outboxes
Soup Mail
Poetry Contests
Contest Results/Status
Followers
Poems of Poets I Follow
Friend Builder
Soup Social
Poetry Forum
New/Upcoming Features
The Wall
Soup Facebook Page
Who is Online
Link to Us
Member Poems
Poems - Top 100 New
Poems - Top 100 All-Time
Poems - Best
Poems - by Topic
Poems - New (All)
Poems - New (PM)
Poems - New by Poet
Poems - Random
Poems - Read
Poems - Unread
Member Poets
Poets - Best New
Poets - New
Poets - Top 100 Most Poems
Poets - Top 100 Most Poems Recent
Poets - Top 100 Community
Poets - Top 100 Contest
Famous Poems
Famous Poems - African American
Famous Poems - Best
Famous Poems - Classical
Famous Poems - English
Famous Poems - Haiku
Famous Poems - Love
Famous Poems - Short
Famous Poems - Top 100
Famous Poets
Famous Poets - Living
Famous Poets - Most Popular
Famous Poets - Top 100
Famous Poets - Best
Famous Poets - Women
Famous Poets - African American
Famous Poets - Beat
Famous Poets - Cinquain
Famous Poets - Classical
Famous Poets - English
Famous Poets - Haiku
Famous Poets - Hindi
Famous Poets - Jewish
Famous Poets - Love
Famous Poets - Metaphysical
Famous Poets - Modern
Famous Poets - Punjabi
Famous Poets - Romantic
Famous Poets - Spanish
Famous Poets - Suicidal
Famous Poets - Urdu
Famous Poets - War
Poetry Resources
Anagrams
Bible
Book Store
Character Counter
Cliché Finder
Poetry Clichés
Common Words
Copyright Information
Grammar
Grammar Checker
Homonym
Homophones
How to Write a Poem
Lyrics
Love Poem Generator
New Poetic Forms
Plagiarism Checker
Poetics
Poetry Art
Publishing
Random Word Generator
Spell Checker
Store
What is Good Poetry?
Word Counter
Email Poem
Your IP Address: 216.73.216.110
Your Email Address:
Required
Email Address Not Valid.
To Email Address:
Email Address Not Valid.
Required
Subject
Required
Personal Note:
Poem Title:
Poem
On July 15, 2010, my wife, Teri, and I took our younger daughter, Isabel, to the doctor for a regular checkup. She was nine months old and appeared to be in perfect health. Her first teeth had come in, and she was now regularly eating with us at the dinner table, babbling and shoving rice cereal into her mouth. A cheerful, joyous child, she had a fondness for people, which she had not, the joke went, inherited from her grumpy father. Teri and I always went together to our children’s doctor’s appointments, and this time we also took Ella, Isabel’s big sister, who was almost three. The nurse took Isabel’s temperature and measured her weight, height, and head circumference, and Ella was happy that she didn’t have to undergo the same ordeal. . Everything seemed fine, except for her head circumference. The doctor was concerned. Reluctant to send Isabel for an MRI, he scheduled an ultrasound exam for the following day. The following morning, Isabel underwent an ultrasound exam of her head, crying in Teri’s arms throughout the procedure. he ventricles of Isabel’s brain were enlarged, full of fluid. Like an Aquarium. An MRI was urgently needed. She received antibiotics and underwent a scan or two. I left the hospital and went home to be with Ella. I talked to Ella about Isabel’s being sick, about her tumor, and told her that she would have to stay with Grandma that night. She didn’t complain or cry; she understood, as well as any three-year-old could, the difficulty of our problem. She had just over a pint of blood in her body. Ella came to see her that afternoon and, as always, made her laugh by pretending to grab little chunks of her cheeks and eat them. After Ella left, Isabel was agitated as I held her. I realized that she was twitching and whimpering every thirty seconds or so. Then she went into a full-blown seizure: she stiffened, her eyes rolled back, her mouth foamed as she twitched. Teri and I held her hands and talked to her, but she was not aware of us. Teri is in the corner weeping ceaselessly and quietly, the terror on her face literally unspeakable; the gray-haired attending doctor is issuing orders as residents take turns compressing Isabel’s chest, because her heart has stopped beating. They bring her back, as I wail, “My baby! My baby! My baby!” There is a good chance that she will not survive the surgery. Her heart stops beating again; the residents are compressing her chest. My baby! My baby! My baby!”
CAPTCHA Preview
Type the characters you see in the picture
Required