My White Coat

My White Coat

Stuffed heavy with gadgets, notes, and articles to read

It’s an indicator to the layman of my lifelong obsession

To understanding the human condition

In the most scientific of ways

Trimmed to the hem of my waist, it’s a marker for my intellectual incompetence amongst the buzzing macrocosm on the hospital wards

The worn lapel weighs my dedication to “do no harm:

Each cuff a promise to never fear my mistakes

Pockets stuffed with endless questions from loved ones and friends

Urgent for some curbside medicine

Each button promises the secrets I keep in the name of confidentiality

My white coat

Is an invitation for endless learning and the freedom of mistakes

Is a shield protecting me from heavy responsibilities

Is a barrier for me to prove competent in the chaos of endless unfinished tasks

Is a “gazelle mark” to the house staff

Flagging me as the useless Med Student

As I clumsily bounce in and out of the way

My white coat

Is not an invitation for cruel pimping

Is not a reason for isolation out of a patient’s care

Is not a reason for nurses to ignore my presence

Is not an assumption that I cannot contribute

Is not a liability

My white coat

Is a temporary shell I carry as I crawl through the entrance of medicine

Teeter tottering like the neophyte I am

Eyes wide with wonder of such complexities

Mind overwhelmed with the knowledge pouring in ceaselessly

My white coat

Is something I will shed one day and hang

Next to a longer one

The final stage of my metamorphosis

Is a reminder that I might one day forget what it was like

To be young and small

And to cherish the protected learning and forgiveness

So I may learn all that I can

My white coat is passage of time, the physical embodiment of another chapter of this long, ever-learning life