The poem "To the Doctor who Treated the Raped Baby and Who Felt Such Despair" seems to move between contrasting settings. Write a paragraph in...

Finnuala Dowling is directly addressing the physician in her poem “To the doctor who treated the raped baby and who felt such despair.” The lines of the poem vacillate between settings; that of the treatment facility where the doctor works on the injured child, and different locations where children are cared for with love and respect.

I just wanted to say on behalf of us all

that on the night in question

there was a...

Finnuala Dowling is directly addressing the physician in her poem “To the doctor who treated the raped baby and who felt such despair.” The lines of the poem vacillate between settings; that of the treatment facility where the doctor works on the injured child, and different locations where children are cared for with love and respect.

I just wanted to say on behalf of us all

that on the night in question

there was a light on in the hall

for a nervous little sleeper

and when the bleeding baby was admitted to your care

On the night the baby is raped, around the world, there are others who leave lights on for children who are afraid of the dark, there are uncles singing lullabies, there are children lovingly nursed, and there are mothers inviting their little ones into their warm beds in the middle of the night. The reader goes back and forth between the horrors endured by the baby and the normalcy experienced by other children. In the end, the narrator wants the doctor to know that people can sleep peacefully, turning a blind eye to the abuse, knowing that the doctor is there to care for the child.

and when finally you stood exhausted at the end of her cot

and asked, “Where is God?”,

a father sat watch.

And for the rest of us, we all slept in trust