"The physician as poet" review of: Pereira, Peter Saying the World

Joel Weishaus

doi:10.1186/1747-5341-1-8

Abstract

Peter Pereira is a family physician and a poet. I weave excerpts from Dr. Pereira's poems into a brief history of medicine's mythological and historical roots, beginning with the Egyptian god Thoth, and the Greek physician Hippocrates. Along the way, I touch on the European Middle Ages and the Islamic World. Finally, I quote poet-critic T.S. Eliot, who was an early influence on Dr. Pereira's decision to become a poet, and contemporary physician-poets Rafael Campo and William Carlos Williams. I end by placing Dr. Pereira, whose practice is oriented toward immigrant families, in his indigenous Pacific Northwest, arguing that being both physician and poet helps Pereira to live in a world that is both intimately human and naturally impersonal.

Highlights

Peter Pereira is a physician who has lived in Seattle, WA. for most of his life
One of a growing number of doctors who balance the craft of medicine with poetry's intuitive tropes, Pereira begins this first collection with a poem titled "Nosophilia," which means "love of affliction." Why begin here? "How else count, recount what woes?/Pimples that burn
Very palpable to a doctor, is loss. Because this state of emptiness can begin even before birth, Pereira initiates the body of his book with a poem titled "Fetus Papyraceous."

Summary

Introduction

Peter Pereira is a physician who has lived in Seattle, WA. for most of his life. He did his undergraduate work in both Biology and English, before attending the University of Washington Medical School.

Results

Conclusion