She went for her yearly Pap Smear
the other day, it had been three years.
There’s a sense of dread
in knowing she will be palpitated
and probed so unlovingly,
examined in clinical specimen fashion.
Every speck of clothes off except her socks,
the gown, “open in front, please”,
the lap drape…sitting, waiting,
eyeing the tray of advanced technology,
plastic speculum, the cervix-scrapper,
the container for the sample,
no more slides, they centrifuge the cells
for greater quantity to examine. Also
the omnipresent K-Y jelly.
Slight shuffle of feet, the rattle
of the file being lifted, and the PA enters.
Chitchat and questions, eyes, ears and nodes
checked, lungs and heart…”lay back, please,
arm behind your head”. Gaze into space
as sensitive fingers rap and probe the breasts,
knowing the lump will be encountered.
A palpable mass, yes, the same one
from ten years ago, mammogrammed,
ultra sounded and aspirated through the years,
a supposed cyst, perhaps larger,
more tests ordered. Great.
“Slide your butt all the way down,”
feet up in stirrups, feeling ridiculous,
smoothness of plastic intruder
cranking open and the pin-prick
of contact, mission completed, almost.
Jellied fingers arrow in as the other hand
presses down on the uterus, feeling its shape.
A quick transition to the rectum, no polyps,
all intrusive apparatus out, butt scoots back
in a smear of K-Y, and it’s over. Except,
there’s the wait to check
for the basis of this indelicate procedure,
atypical cells, cervical cancer.
Until the all clear is given,
the dread continues…sitting, waiting.

Erin Moen
5/8/03
Copyright 2003 ©