Poetry in a Pill
================

* Adam O. Goldstein

*   Poetry
*   Prescribing Patterns
*   Physician

> Today they announced discovery
> 
> of poetry in a pill form.
> 
> Take one 3 times a day,
> 
> no prescription needed.

> Those around me greeted the news
> 
> almost impassively,
> 
> as if a new species had arrived
> 
> with little fanfare,
> 
> and only a few muted smiles.

> The reality eventually took hold,
> 
> as recognition that a long-sought marriage
> 
> had occurred, uniting disciplines and theory,
> 
> aspirations and ability,
> 
> onto a common path where
> 
> breakthroughs are not inevitable,
> 
> but result from continuous creativity.

> We greet new pills for sleep with praise,
> 
> new pills for hearts with awe,
> 
> new pills for pain with relief,
> 
> new pills for pleasure with excitement.
> 
> How then should we greet this,
> 
> the first pill for the soul?
> 
> What emotion do we have
> 
> to acknowledge prolonged insight
> 
> into the nature of existence?

> As we swallow this pill,
> 
> we marvel in the exhalation of voices
> 
> that resonate through centuries,
> 
> in caves, palaces, and prisons,
> 
> in prose, psalms, and stories,
> 
> in words jumping off rocks,
> 
> in the power that radiates
> 
> from the pen and from the mind
> 
> unleashed from rules.

> This is the thought that exhorts us,
> 
> the thought that, like Sisyphus, is never enough
> 
> and pushes us harder, higher, and faster,
> 
> to converse inside a space
> 
> as powerful at this moment
> 
> as the universe above and below,
> 
> formed at the dawn of creation:

> Two millennia of research
> 
> into the nature of the soul
> 
> have finally brought art and science together,
> 
> with millions of new inspirations,
> 
> visions that link faith and science
> 
> and faith.

## Notes

*   This article was externally peer reviewed.

*   *Funding:* none.

*   *Conflict of interest:* none declared.

*   Received for publication April 25, 2013.
*   Revision received March 19, 2014.
*   Accepted for publication April 21, 2014.