Poems and Prayers for Wounded Healers by O’Neill D’Cruz

When Will an American Be Concerned?

They also will answer, “Lord, when did we see you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or needing clothes or sick or in prison, and did not help you?”
– Matthew 25:44

When they annihilated American Indians I did not lament
When they enslaved African Americans I felt no torment
When they interned Japanese Americans I did not protest
When they bombed the Asian continent I did not contest

So, if they dehumanize immigrants
if they defund charitable grants
if they defend as patriotic pride
orders that dis-order and divide

Would I lament?
Feel any torment?
Could I protest?
Should I contest?

If not now, where and when?
If not at all, am I not them?

♦ ♦ ♦

A Wounded Healer’s Prayer

Those that are whole do not need the physician, but they who are sick
– Luke 5:31

One Spirit kindles all matter with a spark
And Nature bears, or forbears with a mark* 
Every wound and unshed tear is a tear
For us to care and bear, cure or forbear

A wounded tree re-covers what lies bare
A wounded animal re-enacts in dreams
A wounded human responds to repair
A wounded god transcends and re-deems

If wounds are portals for Spirit indwelling 
Let grace pour through unconditionally
So both wounds and their healing 
Reveal all life as gift, whole and holy

May I be kindled and Spirit-sealed
By my wounds, may all be healed!

(*Wood burns, wax melts
Clay is baked, coal embered
Oil heats, ore smelts
Gold is refined, steel tempered)

♦ ♦ ♦

Prayer for a Wounded Healer

Physician, heal thyself
– Luke 4:23

Code Red! Doctor Ace in the field
On course to crash and burn down
Bound by oath in the healers’ guild
Atlas in white coat gloves and gown

To cure and save, till Hercules wounded yet brave
Hit the wall, and saw from the mirror
Sisyphus look back, headed for an early grave
Drugs and drams compounded the error

Put on your mask, my sister, my brother
Life lived by others is drudgery and disgrace
Heal yourself before tending to another
Life lived for others as gratitude and grace

Lo! Phoenix rises, to fly free is born
From dust and ashes; ’tis a new morn.

O’Neill D’Cruz retired once from academic clinical practice as a pediatrician and neurologist, a second time from the neuro-therapeutics industry, and now spends his time caring, coaching, and consulting from his home in North Carolina, known locally as the “Southern Part of Heaven.” He is a wounded healer who works to heal the wounded, in order that All Shall Be Well.

Image: Jesús sana a los enfermos, Church of Our Lady of Angels, Santiago, Chile / Rodrigo Fernández / Wikimedia Commonos / CC BY-SA 4.0