[Click here to listen to the poem.]  

Artist’s notes:
“Therapy” shows a corseted head to represent bound-up, traumatic memories. A lot of my work has to do with disorganized thinking, or states of mind. — Janet Snell

From this…

"Outpatient," first draft.

to this…

Once he starts to talk, the therapist
goes on and on comparing the nutrition
in snake to jungle rat.
 
My head screams STOP, but I know he can’t.
 
His pupils dilate to drowning as he knuckles my spine,
and I call on the same God who abandoned his family
to a killing-field floor.
 
I only asked questions out of respect
for his accent. What else should I have done?
 
My gown had come untied. I offered up my stiff back 
in the room mapped with pain, severe with charts
of what can go wrong with a person.
 
Nobody I know, though of that I can’t be certain.
I’ve never recognized a man by his bones.

A peek inside the creative process
"Outpatient" came directly from my first meeting with a new physical therapist, a refugee from Biafra. I had to weed out many of my impressions of the room and the man to get to the heart of the poem, as you can see in the rough draft. — Cheryl Snell
 

Cheryl Louise Snell