Soliloquy in Blue

Those hands of yours can forge new life
by carving organs from their old constraints
and grafting them in those whose own
have failed. I've seen your hands take up a knife
to unlock bodies' mute complaints,
rewrite their fates. Why then am I, alone,

untouchable by hands that dare so much?
Were I not wearing blue, I'd ask
you, teach me more about how touch commands.
But I'm across the table, such
that what I see of you above your mask
will have to stand in for your hands.

Mina Le is an otolaryngologist, and head and neck surgeon at the West Palm Beach VA Medical Center in South Florida. While attending Harvard University, she studied poetry and received the James Buell Munn Award for literary talent. A native of Minneapolis, she obtained her MD from Harvard Medical School.