SECOND SHOT

by Tracey Gratch

Crocuses through morning frost feign hope

that even in this time of gloom, as Cambridge

bars are shuttered tight and on Mass Ave.

foot traffic’s light, and yet, and yet it’s barely

spring, despite the losses reigning in—

The moment for a second shot; resilience

grit, on second thought.

Tracey Gratch lives south of Boston with her husband and their four children. Her poems have appeared in publications including Post Road, Mezzo Cammin, The Literary Bohemian, Annals of Internal Medicine, Boston Literary Magazine, TheNewVerse.News, and The Yale Journal for Humanities in Medicine. Her poem "Strong Woman" is included in On Being A Doctor, Volume 4, from the American College of Physicians.

MESSAGE FROM FRIDA KAHLO

upon learning Mattel is producing a Barbie Doll in her image

by Tracey Gratch

Self-Portrait with Cropped Hair by Frida Kahlo. Barbie® Inspiring Women™ Frida Kahlo Doll.

Banal attempts at re-creation fail.
What minds would mold me, plastic, sweet and frail?
I’ve eclipsed your constructs, circumvented your ideal;
My likeness etched in psyches, read like braille.
Though capitalistic plots may garner some appeal—
I muse at this pale folly; truth lies in detail.


Tracey Gratch lives just south of Boston with her husband and their four children. Her poems have appeared or are scheduled to appear in publications including Post Road, Mezzo Cammin, The Literary Bohemian, Annals of Internal Medicine, Boston Literary Magazine, TheNewVerse.News, and The Yale Journal for Humanities in Medicine. Her poem "Strong Woman" is included in On Being A Doctor, Volume 4, from the American College of Physicians.

THE VERSATILITY OF BLUE

by Tracey Gratch

The world’s newest shade of blue, a brilliantly bright, durable pigment called YInMn blue, has been licensed for commercial use and is already in the hands of some artists. The pigment was discovered in 2009 by chemist Mas Subramanian and his team at Oregon State University while they were conducting experiments connected to electronics. For one series of tests, the scientists mixed black manganese oxide with a variety of chemicals and heated them to 2,000 degrees Fahrenheit. (The name comes from the pigment’s elemental makeup, which includes Yttrium, Indium and Manganese.) —artnet news, June 20, 2016

Blue is sapphire when on fire
blue is indigo in the night sky
Blue is cobalt, elemental,
YInMn's bright – blue's latest dye

Blue is navy when it’s strong
blue is sadness in a song
Blue is the diver drown in the lake
blue's the baby miscarried for heaven's sake

Blue is turquoise tile in the bath
blue's the jay to cross my path
Blood, spent, returns through sky-blue veins –
to the heart to be renewed again.


Tracey Gratch lives in Quincy, MA with her husband and their four children. Several of her poems have appeared at TheNewVerse.News.

SAMIZDAT

by Tracey Gratch

A Russian court has convicted poet and teacher Alexander Byvshev of ‘inciting enmity’ and sentenced him to 300 hours of community service, confiscated his computer and prohibited him from working as a school teacher for two years.  His ‘crime’ – the poem ‘To Ukrainian Patriots’ in which he expresses his opposition to Russia’s annexation of Crimea and suggests Ukrainians should ensure that not one inch of Crimea is handed “to Putin’s chekists”.  —Human Rights in Ukraine (KHPG), July 14, 2015

The storefront windows dim with filth and soot.
Cyrillic, signs hold sway and hang above
the wooden-blocks paving the streets in rot.

In nineteen-twenty-one the husband's shot –
The committee puts its strangle-hold on nearly
everything the others wrote, and thought.

Damp fire-wood and famine, typhus rages
in darkened spaces – their words, to memory,
then burned.  An apartment bare, but for the language,

whispered in the cold rail cars which pass
beneath the towers. Outside a prison's gate,
in the crowd she waits to see her son, for hours.

Here, a crimson-history is wrought:
"Can you describe this?"  She said, "I can."  She thought.


Author’s note: Alexander Byvshev’s situation is reminiscent of the plight of other Russian poets, including Anna Achmatova, (whom the poem is about) in post-revolutionary Russia, when Achmatova's work was officially stifled, though it continued to circulate in secret (samizdat), her work hidden passed and read in the gulags. With the conviction of Alexander Byvshev it seems that Russia is returning to the practice of censoring  and persecuting its writers for their political views. 

Tracey Gratch lives in Quincy, MA with her husband and their four children. Her poems have appeared in  publications including Mezzo Cammin,  The Literary Bohemian, The Flea, Annals of Internal Medicine, Boston Literary Magazine,  The New Verse News and The Yale Journal for Humanities in Medicine. Her poem, "Strong Woman" is included in the American College of Physicians, On Being A Doctor, Volume 4.

RIDE AT DUSK

by Tracey Gratch

For their first event of the year, J Street Swarthmore gathered with other student organizations for a vigil in memory of the Israelis and Palestinians who lost their lives this summer. Image and caption from J Street on FaceBook, September 6, 2014.

i.m. Daniel Tragerman


A distant recurrence
brings death to the door;
hollow, the victory,
made brutal by war.

With darkness descending
and cars rushing past
I pedal, ascending,
as images flash

chiaroscuro through trees
now fading to gray;
there's one that remains
at the end of the day --

His soul will be borne
in a scrapbook of hope;
a mother will mourn,
sustaining the trope.

 Chickatawbut Hill looms;
 I'm going for broke.


Author’s note: This poem came while biking through the Blue Hills in Milton, MA at dusk, shortly after reading the story of the death of Daniel Tragerman, the 4-year-old Israeli boy who was killed in his home on August 22 by shrapnel from a mortar shell fired from Gaza.


Tracey Gratch lives in Quincy, MA with her husband and their four children. Her poems have appeared in various and sundry publications including, Mezzo Cammin, The Literary Bohemian, The Flea, Annals of Internal Medicine, Boston Literary Magazine, The New Verse News and The Yale Journal for Humanities in Medicine. Her poem, "Strong Woman" is included in the American College of Physicians, On Being A Doctor, Volume 4.

METASTASIS

by Tracey Gratch

As oncology has become the hottest space within pharmaceuticals and biotech, the annual American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO) is pretty much now the Super Bowl for companies in this space. Meetings like ASCO [May 30 - June 3, 2014] certainly do lead to companies releasing important data on pipeline candidates, as well as often hosting meetings/presentation to explain their pipelines and development strategies in more details. It's worth remembering, though, that a lot of what is presented is early stage, includes limited number of patients, and often focuses on metrics like response rate that are ultimately less significant than metrics like overall survival. -- Stephen D., Simpson, The Motley Fool, May 16, 2014. Image source: ASCO.

I attend the morning session
hopeful, there might be
a trial, maybe something;
she'll fit the thing they need.

Poker-faced, the lead guy says
the endpoints went unmet in this phase three,
but in some subset, it looks promising.

Back home, things would deteriorate;
she'll go back in this week,

as I'll wander the exhibit hall, endless
and commercialized, in ways nearly obscene.
The start-ups and the biotechs, lure attendees
in with chocolate crepes and fresh coffee.

At 2 PM, another friend will text:
she's made it through,
and on her brain, some pressure's been relieved.

There, staring dazed and vacantly, (after all,
it is day three) through the haze of late-stage entities,
through the fleeting, spit-shined pipeline dreams --

the posters offer palpably: the best
the best can offer here can offer only
two to three, and maybe improve quality;
and none of it comes free.


Tracey Gratch lives in Quincy, MA with her husband and their four children. Her poems have appeared in journals and  publications including Mezzo Cammin, The Literary Bohemian, The Flea, Annals of Internal Medicine, Boston Literary Magazine,  The New Verse News and The Yale Journal for Humanities in Medicine. Her poem, "Strong Woman" is included in the American College of Physicians, On Being A Doctor, Volume 4, published in April, 2014.

THE STORM

by Tracey Gratch

Image source: boston.com

The sea throws its weight on an unwary shore
The sand, without wisdom, changes in form
And I, as the calm in the eye of the storm,

Have survived every wound your poor body had borne
The scars, as I read them, though faded and worn,
A subtle reminder; the center, still torn.

The sea hurls white ice at my feet as I stand
At the threshold of hope, where my life had began.
Unlikely that I would endure this dire hand

To emerge from the current as strengthened and whole,
Escaping the grasp of the strong undertow;
I pretend now to learn things, that always, I've known.

The storm will disperse and the water return
To the blue, where I live, at the edge of the earth.
Awaiting a sign, I await now a birth.

I look to the sky, the clouds taking form,
A silent forewarning; prepare for the storm.


Tracey Gratch lives in Quincy, MA with her husband and their four children. Her poems have been published in various and sundry on-line and print publications. She is at home, preparing for the storm.