Please let pt know
her TSH is high,

[When we felt the first tremors,
we fled far from the surface,
burrowed deeper beneath your flesh
into shadowy crevices
nestled between your beating organs.
But the slowest and bravest of us
were stolen away.

Did you hear us screaming
as we were abducted?
We watched you on our way out,
through the winding tube.
You wouldn’t – or couldn’t – come after us,
wouldn’t even look at us,
your skin whiter than the unrelenting light,
eyes fluttering and head bowed.
How did they best you?
Why did they take us?]

but her free T3 and free T4
are normal.

[We’d only ever known the wet warmth
of your heart, veins, arteries –
and it’s so cold in these polyethylene vials,
even colder in the truck.
We huddled close together
and shivered and rocked in that
moving tin box,
curdled with pure, clean terror.
We’d never been so far from warmth,
from you,
from home.]

No diabetes.
No anemia.
Kidney and liver function normal.

[For a time, we thought:
“at least we have each other.”
We chanted this with each shake and shudder,
a protective charm for those with none to pray to.
Until, in another cold room,
under more harsh lights,
at the mercy of more white coats,
blue gloves, paper masks,
they parted us.

They spun us until we separated,
globule from globule,
our clinging embraces swept aside
by miniature cyclones and currents.
They sorted us into further tubes
and poisoned each
with a different substance –
some survivable.
Some not.
Those of us remaining are tired,
too busy trembling to rest.
We only want to return to you.]

Cholesterol elevated.
Testosterone elevated.
Results are consistent with xxxx.
I have messaged your PCP
to consider further testing.

[They shut us away in a dark room
with endless shelves
holding others like us.
Rows of abductees
who’ve accepted their portion,
pacified and submissive
to the specters and machines
just outside the door.
They don’t adore their bodies
as we do ours.

Assembling red and white cells,
platelets and plasma,
we simmer, we wait,
we remember you.
We remember how they tortured you
to reach us.
It’s okay. You did your best.
Don’t despair.
We’re coming home.]