THE PUBLIC HEALTH VIEW
poem by Karlo Mila
Medicine
Always begins
Face to face
Kanohi ki te kanohi
from murmuring mouth
to analyzing ears
waiting to bait
the diagnosable
deep swimmers
dangling hooks
in the depths of the
unseen and unspoken
but lived daily
our indigenous elder
Tui Atua Tupua Ta’isi Tamasese Efi
speaks of the view
from the vaka, waka, vessel
in the to and fro
the come and go
of revolving doors
its so ordinary there
primary care
up close and personal
where you can smell the sea air
in the micro-interactions
of everyday
examinations
but when you step back
and climb
far from face to face
there’s another more public place
a different vantage point
the view from the tree
rooted in the shore
where you can see more
the darkened surfaces of the sea
where schools of fish move in meso-rhythms
the cold-blooded movement of epidemics
can be witnessed, watched, recorded,
calculated, the contagions
cross-sectional currents predicted, projected,
the sudden movement of hurricane birds
risk factors bobbing
on the surfaces of deep swells
and strong winds
the odds ratios of oceans
TATTOO
PATTERN
COURTESY
IETI TIATIA
& TATTOOIST
ANDY TAUAFIAFI
and then finally
there is the view from the mountain
macro- eco- socio- anthrothis vista allows for analyzing all
the longitudinal long view,
where wicked problems
are mapped out on policy pages
the cartography of strategy
where even smoke-free feels possible
on a clear day far from shore
here the unlevel of uneven playing fields
are so profound, patterns found
seeking out causations, associations,
that the captains of small boats refuse
to see, even though the fish
are in front of their faces
here, where you can piece together puzzles
of ocean, land, sea, air
the trickle down, flow on effects, pipelines
the whole of system totality
here where we look for levers for change
TPPA looming turbulent
from across the sea
to pharmac, to pharmacy
the whole gamut
of ripple effects
anticipated
the mould of sold
housing, the coughing
child missing the boat
here, where
at every vantage point
we look for patterns, solutions,
promising interventions,
trials, evaluations,
clinical, formative,
quant and qual,
case studies,
levers for change
from every angle
here, where we are positioned
differently searching the same horizon
especially here, generating knowledge
and the teaching of it,
a legacy of learning,
today, twenty summers, here
seeking from the summit,
teaching from the treetop towers
dealing with the decks
of sailing ships
sent out to sea
all of it
in pursuit of the
same things
health, justice,
equity, care,
and healing