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Clinician’s Guide to the Soul
Poems, 2008, 96 pages
American Journal of Nursing Book of the Year

$18
Order: Amazon.com or Direct

“I imagined poetry might, if given the chance, even heal medicine itself.”
—Rafael Campo
The Healing Art

This small pocket-size book contains 45 of my poems and 10 prints by Rachel Dickerson, a young artist whose work inspires me in the same way a poem can.

The title feels risky—clinician and soul and the promise of guidance! But the poems are hard won and long pondered. They come out of my personal and professional experience in health care as well as my exploration of healing art. I’d like to think you might turn to them for insight, diversion, sustenance or healing as you wrestle with the challenges of clinical practice, illness, death and life.

Clinician’s Guide to the Soul was written for health workers, family caregivers, patients and all who turn to poetry to plumb the depths of our common humanity.

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Rehab at the Florida Avenue Grill
Poems, 1999, 104 pages

$13
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Embedded in these poems are stories from my work as a nurse. They often began as conversations with colleagues or journal entries written in celebration, sorrow, or frustration at the end of a day. Some were first published in the annual reports of the small clinic where I worked, then made their way into the literature of my profession. Others appeared in literary magazines. I have served them up as soul food for caregivers and as tribute to the many patients whose lives changed mine.

I’m pleased that the Maine Humanities Council has selected Rehab as one of the Favorite Readings for its seminal program, Literature & Medicine: Humanities at the Heart of Health Care
.

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Ninth Street Notebook—
Voice of a Nurse in the City
Short pieces on nursing and health care from an
inner-city clinic, 2001, 208 pages
American Journal of Nursing Book of the Year

$18
Buy e-book: Study Tactics
Order: Amazon.com

Download free: Low res (3 MB) | High res (12MB)

What did I learn about health care in the United States by serving as nurse and director of a small clinic in a rough and tumble neighborhood in Washington D.C. for most of two decades? Plenty, as it turns out. Most of these short, first person essays addressing issues from clinical practice to health care financing were first published in nursing journals. I have organized them along with some illuminating “etceteras” (poems, photographs, writings by my colleagues) into what I hope is a cohesive and meaningful whole.

You may now download Ninth Street Notebook — Voice of a Nurse in the City in its entirety as a PDF to read online or print at no cost.

Please select the resolution you’d like to download:
Low resolution: Download (approx. 3 MB)
High resolution: Download (approx. 12 MB)

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“Clinician” Postcard
Poem

$6 (for 10 postcards)
Order: Direct

Clinician

Golf, tennis
even jazz has them now—
the cat who comes to hear you play,
hone your chops and
find your truth.

But it started with us,
nurses, physicians
hunched over the sickbed,
bringing to bear our senses,
skill, intelligence—

purely human, fallible.
No help from silicon chips,
telemetry, robotics.
I can still catch a glimpse
in the rear view mirror.

Those were the days
when your instrument was you,
when every patient’s truth
was his own.

—Veneta Masson

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“Nurses” Postcard
Poem

$6 (for 10 postcards)
Order: Direct

Nurses

A baby’s born. Its first faint cry is drowned
in mother’s tears both for what is and for
what should have been—a perfect child.
Around them nurses set about their healing chores.

A breast is gone and in its place a gash
across the very heart of womanhood
still bleeds in tiny kills.
Unabashed a nurse keeps vigil, willing loss to good.

A beam collapsed and left him less a man.
He rattles bedrails, pelts the air with curses.
A nurse confronts him eye to eye and hand
to trembling hand.
            I want to ask these nurses

Do you face the dark because you trust in light?
Or is it that you’ve come to terms with night?

—Veneta Masson

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Poems from Clinician’s Guide to the Soul
Click Here The Poet’s Job
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Watch & Listen

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Click Here Listen to Veneta's workshop, "Clinician's Guide to the Soul," sponsored by the Maine Humanities Council.