A poem for one’s gallbladder – what gall! And poet Robin Stratton certainly has it.

Robin Stratton has been a writing coach in the Boston area for almost 20 years. She is the author of The Revision Process, A Guide for Those Months or Years Between Your First Draft and Your Last, and two chapbooks, Dealing with Men and Interference from an Unwitting Species. A two-time Pushcart Prize nominee, she’s been published in Word Riot, 63 Channels, Antithesis Common, Poor Richards Almanac(k), Blink-Ink, Pig in a Poke, Chick Flicks, Up the Staircase, Shoots and Vines and many others. Her novel, On Air, (2011, Blue Mustang Press) was a finalist in the Indie Press Excellence Award. A second novel, Of Zen and Men, is now available from Big Table Publishing Company. She’d love to have you visit her at robinstratton.com.

Vestigial You
~ for GB

You have been with me my whole life.
Pear-shaped pouch nestled beneath
my diaphragm; anatomically obsolete but
willing to aid in my digestion by storing bile.

Your revolt began when I was 25
and for the next 25 years you masqueraded
as an ulcer; rebelling against stress and responding
to antacids popped one, two, sometimes three.

Finally one night you sent me to the ER.
Outlaw in my upper abdomen, you
harbored stones who waged war on my
narrow, irritable bile ducts.

I attempted to implement a Peace Treaty
with you; I would eat less fat and you would
continue to do your job. An agreement
you violated within just a few months.

And so, gallbladder, I took you to see a surgeon.
She said What are you waiting for? Have it out!
Any normal person would have said Okay; but I resisted.
Like it or not, you are part of me.

I asked my surgeon, Can we take out the stones
but leave the gallbladder in? And she laughed;
It’s not a gallbladder issue, she explained.
It’s a bile issue. And suddenly I understood.

GB, it wasn’t your fault; you did nothing wrong.
Like a competent, efficient foreman you coordinated
and monitored your part of the process.
You worked hard, you’ve been great.

That’s why I am so sad to say that you will not
be rewarded for your 50+ years of service;
you will be eased out through an unsuspecting
orifice, and discarded.

The stones will go to a lab to be biopsied.
And I will go home, belly dotted with stitches,
and have to face my furious naval; its
opening a startled bruised O!

– Robin Stratton

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