Dr. Shashikant Dudhgaonkar is a physician and poet whose work bridges the examining room and the examined life. Raised in Pune, India, long walks to St. Patrick’s High School became his first lessons in observation. His mother, a school teacher, nurtured his love for Marathi literature, while teachers encouraged his early verses in English. At St. Vincent’s high school library, he discovered Tolstoy and Frost, Forsyth and Byron, literary immersion that shaped his sensibility before medical college demanded different attention. After completing his MBBS and Diploma in Child Health from **B.J. Medical College, Pune**, he has served since 2000 as **Co-ordinator of the Health Centre at Savitribai Phule Pune University**, where daily encounters with patients, their pain, resilience, and quiet dignity, continue to shape his understanding of witnessing and persistence. During COVID-19’s enforced stillness, scattered observations finally cohered into sustained practice. *Weight of Witnessing* is the result: a physician’s gaze turned inward and outward, bearing witness without looking away. Dr. Dudhgaonkar lives in Pune with his wife, Dr. Shilpa Dudhgaonkar.