Kevin Hulme

The Price of Being

So here we all sit in heavy silence,

With the Odd dull Whispered Word sailing by.

Waiting. For Waiting is the damnedest  part,

Averted Eye contact a lifetime taught,

A thousand and One times the leaflet Read:

\'Would you like to follow me Mr Bruce\',

She asks in a measured clear Sing Song Voice.

And so he wanders off to hear his fate

From a Doctor sat with Thumb,  North  or South,

Like a Medical Roman Emperor. 

Magnified  Words falling with a dense tread.

While outside Nurses hurry in their  Scrubs-

The Uniform of Pubescent dreams gone,

Carrying Blood Samples and Nasal Swabs,

And Bedpans discreetly hid from our view;

The last indignity that awaits us.

And with Hips swinging there\'s an urgent need,

To take her away from this, Blue Angel:

The Wet smell of the Clinically Clean,

The Constant Reassurance of \'All\'s Well\',

A Spoonful of Sugar helps the Medicine,

And Declare my all to the \'Mouth of Truth\',

To know that we will always have Paris,

Carve her Name in a Poem for the Ages.

But Dreams are all we have, a Vital Fuel,

The Sole difference between Stick or Twist,

Or the Thousand Miles between YES and NO.

And here I feel is the Price of Being:

For we begin in Hospital and End;

A Train Station of  Hello\'s and Goodbyes.

And  Between Bookends to Biography-

Supermarkets and days out to  Margate.