
Typewriter Series #2688 by Tyler Knott Gregson
Read an article this morning, scientists
unable to study pain, the headline read.
Too subjective, too much flux in how it was
reported. On a scale of 1 to 10,
how much does this hurt? One patient’s
6 is another’s 2, the opposite
so very often true.
Instead they test reactions, instinctual
and born in, add some heat to a paw
watch how quickly the animal yanks it away,
this is as close to understanding,
they say, as close as we’ll come.
A baseline, they say they’re after,
but there’s a rub, once injured,
that reaction quickens, that baseline
drops. Less heat but more pain.
Tell me this then, white lab coats
and hypotheses spinning like spider’s
silk: How, after all those years of burning,
all that fire on the soft skin
of my palms, did I refuse
to pull away?
-Tyler Knott Gregson-
Published on August 06, 2019 19:16