Ode to a Perfect Pancreas

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1

I hadn’t realised just how much my pancreas did for me until it stopped working properly and I became a Type 1 diabetic. What a thing of beauty a fully-working pancreas is! I am happy to say that this poem has been published in Diabetes UK's magazine 'Balance' and will also be included in Diabetes Hands Foundation's 'No Sugar Added' poetry anthology ;)

Ode to a Perfect Pancreas

Oh Pancreas, perfect Pancreas,

Oh will you please be mine?

And let me feel the touch of your

Secretions endocrine?

My own dear pancreas failed me

And has left me in the lurch

What can I do to make you mine

And end my ceaseless search?

I love your Islets of Langerhans,

Suffused with treasured stores

Of beta cells, all working well,

A credit to their cause!

The insulin that you put forth,

Oh! If it only could

Restrict the upper limits of

The sweetness in my blood!

You’d be the organ of my dreams,

I’d always treat you well,

And if I could I’d lavish love

On each and every cell!

Oh please, O perfect pancreas,

Your functioning’s divine,

So let me be the one for you –

Your Type 1 Valentine!

2

Someday, sooner than later we all hope. Is the pancreas of Valentine’s past your Muse? Keep the excellent poetry flowing, Alan. We need it.

3

Your Type 1 Valentine

Lovely