Drug Du Jour

When I become so disgusted with a situation, I find it helps me get out my frustration by compressing it all into a tightly metered and rhymed poem with a good bite to it. I spent several years working in the behavioral health industry—and believe me, it is an industry! I wrote this poem about the time I left it. I never published this until now. Enjoy!

DRUG DU JOUR
By Deborah Smith Parker

Today the care in mental health
Generates a growth in wealth
For pushers of the sleek brochure
Who tout their latest drug du jour.

They tell us that a psychic wound
Means chemistry must be retuned.
They exorcise our inner devils
Manipulating our blood levels.

But what of their dispersal arm,
The shrinks, do they feel no alarm
That no one now pulls up a chair
To sit with patients in despair?

Insurance pays for mega-doses
For depression or psychosis,
But they don’t probe or delve below—
Just patch them up and out they go!

People drug stitched ‘round the edges
Feeling hopeless jump off ledges.
Does anyone now seek a cure,
Or just the latest drug du jour?