Writing at the Intersection of Medicine, Memory, and Meaning

Physician, essayist, and observer of ordinary lives. Through stories of medicine, family, Jewish identity, and the places we carry within us, I explore how healing continues long after the body is well.

Selected work for agents & publishers

Selected Manuscripts

Published & In Progress

[PUBLISHED — 2026]

Lives Inside of Boxes

“A lot of memories returned when I began opening the 9 large storage boxes stacked high in the corner of my home office. When I retired from being a full-time family physician last year, file drawers and cabinets were emptied into these boxes. Articles, various clippings, journals, laminated guides, scoring sheets, immunization schedules, plastic wheels for calculating pregnancy due dates, protocols for adrenal insufficiency—decades of accumulation. The boxes have sat there for months. Opening them felt like acknowledging something final.”

Published in JAMA Online and JAMA print edition.

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[Published October 2026]

What the Odyssey Taught Me About Simchat Torah

“What the Odyssey Taught Me About Simchat Torah.” Kol Yisra’el, Temple Israel Long Beach, October 2026, p. 8.

Read the essay in the October 2026 issue of Kol Yisra’el

[Work in Progress]

A Beginning, and Also A Return: A Meditation on Healing

“I began by writing a simple collection of essays. Somewhere along the way, it became a literary memoir told in essays.”

A Beginning, and Also a Return is a linked collection of literary essays in which a retired family physician examines memory, caregiving, Jewish identity, sexuality, aging, and the ordinary places where healing occurs—from locker rooms and grocery stores to hospital corridors and neighborhood back doors. Moving between childhood in Ohio and adulthood in California, the essays ask how we become ourselves and how, through memory and ritual, we repeatedly return to the people and places that made us.

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1. Sample Essay: The Back Door 2. Sample Essay: Hospital of Emotions

[STANDALONE ESSAYS]

Individual Essays

Not every essay belongs to a collection. Some are complete conversations in themselves.

Aftertaste

Artistic Practice

Exploring healing through memory, observation, poetry, and photography.

Shabbat Chol HaMoed Pesach — poem and photograph by Matt Davis

Jewish Reflections from India — Mixbook poetry and photography by Matt Davis

Matt's Poetry Pages — handcrafted watercolor book created by artist Debi Felsenthal, 2026

Infinite Horizon — poem and photograph by Matt Davis, 2026

Physician-Writer-Observer

In 2025, I retired after more than three decades of practicing family medicine. During those years, I learned that careful observation—and listening to both what is spoken and what is left unsaid—reveals much. Every person carries a story beyond symptoms, and every encounter offers a glimpse into the ways people adapt, endure, and heal.

My work now continues through writing, poetry, and photography. Drawing from medicine, family, Jewish life, travel, and memory, I explore the human experiences that cannot be measured in a chart or by a device. I am interested in the moments and memories that shape who we become, and in what lies just beneath the surface—where identity, loss, resilience, and healing come into focus.

Representation & Inquiries

For agents & publishers.

Sample chapters, full manuscripts, and high-resolution artwork available on request. Direct inquiries are welcome.

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Selected Manuscripts

Lives Inside of Boxes

What the Odyssey Taught Me About Simchat Torah

A Beginning, and Also A Return: A Meditation on Healing

Individual Essays

Artistic Practice

Shabbat Chol HaMoed Pesach

Jewish Reflections from India

Matt's Poetry Pages

Infinite Horizon

Physician-Writer-Observer

For agents & publishers.