The reason I created this blog is to take care of a clogged downspout. For 36 years I have been immersed in academic medicine as an emergency physician, department chair, associate dean, and now as a coach for leaders of the future. But there is another interest, even passion, that goes back to my boyhood – creative writing. I have kept a journal, and written poems, and musings since medical school. A small number of these have been published. And that’s where the downspout comes in. My creative writing output is like rainwater stuck behind the matted leaves of a good, long professional life, and I’m unclogging through this blog and other outlets. I will share some of these writings weekly with you with no expectation of comment or discussion, but just to have flow in this great new phase of life.
During medical school at the University of Rochester School of Medicine and Dentistry (which I was very fortunate to be accepted to – I got in off the wait list 2 weeks before classes started), I found that I needed to write creatively as a counter to the deep study of medical science. Two people were incredibly helpful as mentors and gentle critics for what I shared with them. Kathryn Montgomery, PhD directed a humanities program in the medical school – one of the first of its kind. When I timidly met with her and showed her some of what I was writing she was supportive, curious, and told me I should take a poetry class on the University of Rochester main campus. I somehow managed to do that during the busy second year of medical school. The instructor was the poet Jarold Ramsey whose writing and teaching prowess I came to admire and sought to emulate. I wrote many poems during my medical school years. Some were about medicine and learning medicine, but most were not. One, which I will share later won the William Carlos Williams National Poetry Prize for medical students. But for now, I’ll begin by sharing some old poems mixed with new. If the blog is viewed on a mobile device, the spacing and breaks of lines and stanzas may be a bit off, so best to read on a full screen.
BJZ Poems and Musings 