The Web between the Cracks
Sarah Crosky is a Spanish language medical interpreter at a community healthcare system in Boston, MA. Her poem “The Web Between the Cracks: Interpreting Coronavirus” describes the challenges involved in translating during COVID-19. In our correspondence, she explained that she is now working remotely, making it more challenging to pick up on messages more easily perceived in person. She explained “While we are conduits of language, we also monitor for understanding and misunderstandings from a cultural and linguistic perspective. If necessary, we clarify meaning and offer cultural context. Interpreters help patients amplify their voices and ensure their right to equal access.” This critical work is beautifully expressed in her poetry. (Link to Sarah’s reading below)
The Web between the Cracks
Interpreting Coronavirus
by Sarah Crosky
We hear about the cracks
And the patients who fall through them.
Deemed noncompliant
Forgotten or forgetting...
Or rather, those for whom the system was not made.
Suddenly, in crisis the cracks come into focus
And the sharpened sense of falling through
Primes our ears.
While we are the bridge over which
Two languages cross and find understanding,
These days, we hang low and
Form the web between the cracks.
Telemedicine chaperones,
Links against loneliness,
We don’t hang up until you are heard,
Witnessed
From suffering to health.
We are not the advocates that speak
For the speechless–
We are the advocates that bring
More voices to the chorus.
These days,
The chorus is choppy phone lines,
Cracking vocal cords,
Phone tag, conference calls and
Almost falls.
These days,
Our meeting point is equidistant
Between three homes. And there,
Somehow distance begets intimacy–
Patients call from under the covers
Patients in bathtubs
Patients in tears.
Patients huffing down the stairs to the EMTs.
Our ears are pressed against their moving lips
And worried words, murmuring
Fear, anxiety, relief,
Frustration, impatience, grief.
We even weave these universal languages into
Mutual understanding.
Yet, let’s not confuse this tragedy for poetry,
Let’s instead be reminded that
The work we do is poetic.
These days, there’s no information desk,
Observant receptionist or waiting room
To catch these patients.
Just cell phone towers and voicemail boxes.
So we check for understanding, connect and redirect
Suggest and clarify, clarify, clarify.
When the world gets turned on its head,
We make new meaning of it.
We rewrite the context,
And the choice of expression is not unilateral.
So we give space to the silent thoughts,
The last minute questions,
And the pauses.
We ensure there is not only speaking, but listening.
A global crisis is not the place to cut corners,
But rather to go deeper.
To etch the patient in our minds as the whole circumstances
And world that shape them.
To finally meet them at the crack’s edge.
To hear them from the ground they stand on.
To swing low and catch them in the webbing.
