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Writer's pictureChristopher Merveille

Surgeons of Life

In the Surgeon Must Be Very Careful, the story seems very straightforward. The surgeon performs a very dangerous task that could decide someone's fate. However, I see a weird interpretation that I like a lot better. The surgeon isn’t a real surgeon. We, the readers, are the surgeon and the knife is the decision we make. This weird view of this poem actually fits well with the title. Life is a one-try game. Every choice we commit to lasts forever. We need to treat everything like a life or death operation. I like this theory a lot better because it's important to value life. This poem makes me feel weird because it opens my eyes to how little control we have over life. Thousands of jobs have control over how we live life. Surgeons could be the reason you live or die because they could not handle their job. My last view of this poem is that life cannot be in your control. Judges, juries, lawyers, cops, doctors, and corporations - all these entities affect how we live life and the quality of life. In my first deep look at this poem, I thought the knife represented choice. That was arrogant of me to assume the reader was holding the knife. I think we are the patient instead. We are depending on others and we do not have the luxury of making those decisions. These jobs have all the choices and can afford to make them. This poem reflects our society; the way the upper class might assume they are the surgeon with the ability to choose how their life goes, but the lower class might view themselves as the patient just following the flow of life. I truly like this poem because of how literal the poem is, but I was able to still see a different light to look at it in.

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