Celebrating Poetry: 2019 First-Place Poem

Celebrating poetry and poets is a longstanding tradition at Northeast Ohio Medical University, which recently held its 37^th annual William Carlos Williams Poetry Competition – a contest that nearly 400 students in medical schools across the country entered.

The top three student winners (Sophia Valesca Görgens from Emory University, Kaveh Danesh from the University of California San Francisco and Nikita Raman from the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine) visited the University this spring.

The guest student poets spoke to NEOMED students about their winning poems and read selections of their work; and guest physician-writer Mikkael Sekeres, M.D., from the Cleveland Clinic, talked to the group about what writing means to him.

Here’s this year’s first-place poem.

Pemphigus Vulgaris

Blisters never looked so raw. They hide
under the folds of her breasts, spread outward.

First she is modest, but in her pain
she is bold. Showing us her skin and

watching the crusts picked
clean, the gentamicin applied.

A grimace.
Are you in pain?

Through her interpreter:
No pain.

Through her interpreter:
Keep going.

— Sophia Valesca Görgens from Emory University