I've often wondered how the hospital or hospice experience looks to someone who doesn't work there. Most of us grow up frightened of these places. They are populated by people in various kinds of uniforms and, of course, the occupants are sick.
I came across a fragment of a poem by Susan Mitchell in which she offers a glimpse of the deeper ways poets seem to experience everyday things:
I went to visit a friend, the hospital
room dark except for the branch
I placed in a vase before leaving,
so she might hear the buds
open, no lid no roof for them, as they persisted
in blooming, though severed,
isolated from the tree, sweating
as if running uphill, as if this coming
into blossom were a race, this
opening, all five together, an ache in
the side of the tree, the fragile
anther gasped out-
***
People are forever dying and blooming in hospitals. The gift for the caregiver is that they have the chance to be present for these vital events – and for the pain that often punctuates the time in between. How do experiences change when we seek to express them in some artistic form – painting, poetry, music, or other form?
Happy May Day to you!
-Erie Chapman
p.s. I had to look up the word 'anther.' You may know that it's the pollen-bearing part of the stamen.
Journal of Sacred Work 
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