A Clinical Approach to Limericks

These silly limericks came to me this Friday as my GE CT automated voice boomed out "Breath deep and hold your breath" while its cartoonish Green and Yellow Pac Man figure showed an open mouth and puffed up cheeks just in case I didn't understand English.

I hope they'll bring a moment of levity to you.

Les Coleman (13 April, 2008)

My CT scanner's yellow-green Pac-man,
Rules breathing by some crazy plan
"Just take one puff
Enough is enough,
Or you'll risk ruining the scan".

The PET scanner's small girth
For me is no source of mirth
The hole is so small
I've no room at all
As tight as the day of my birth.

The MRI's head fitting cage
As Dumas wrote page after page
The Man in the Iron Mask
Faced a similar task
To avoid giving way to a rage.

A custom made plastic foam mold
Grabs me so tight in its hold
I can't move an inch
Or so much as flinch
Or radiation won't do as its told.

Blood work, oh blood work, is draining me dry
Test tube by test tube the reason is why
Replacing healthy red hemo
With pallid gray chemo
Leaves me so weak and not a bit spry.

The chemo pump to the port in my chest
Pumps a fluid the doctor thinks best.
The stuff knocks me out
With nary a doubt
But my nurse says I just need the rest.


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