Give me that shot
Saying you will
Ease my pain
For with your ease
I lose the pleasure
Of the ice cream
On my tongue.
Let me have my pain,
And ice cream, now.
The pain will go away
When I can no longer enjoy
the pleasures of my life --
Do not take it, Doctor.
It is mine.
Not, of course, that we, in this modern age, expect that doctor to listen while he calmly writes out the order for the nurse to give the shots: the nurse who cannot change the order, and whose job will make her carry it out. We are civilized. We don't like ice cream.
UPDATE: "any" to "that". Not going to get more specific. There are some good doctors out there who listen to patients in extremis. There are others who become cogs in a death machine.
CORROBORATION:This article brings up the point in a different setting. Most useful quote:
socialist states invariably run out of money once they finally destroy their productive class; and second, the state has neither heart nor soul. To you, Patient X is your beloved mother, or brother, or child. To the state, Patient X is an unnecessary cost to an already strained system.
