Tag: NHS

Iceland

Published on by Sarah DruryLeave a comment

I wrote this poem as a spoken word piece, in response to this coronavirus pandemic, through the eyes of an elderly person who has lived through world war two.

Five hundred quid
Worked all my life for five hundred quid
Ooo, these Tena ladies are on offer
Worked my hands to the bone and my back to the knackers yard, I did
Funny times we live in, funny times
Corona-whatsit rampant, country in lockdown
Just like the war
Our big grown prime minister falling to the floor
Sick people in and out the revolving doors
Crying and dying on hospital floors
People telling me to stay indoors
Only so much of Piers Morgan I can take
And I’m bleeding sick of doing chores
Ooo look, choccy digestives, two for one fifty
Just like the war
But not living on a lump of cheese, a tin of spam and a packet of dried egg
Bring back rationing, it should be the law
All these feckin crazy people
Strippin shelves bare
Hoarding the toilet roll like they don’t care
About how others fare
Oh, I’ll have some of those
Rice pudding, fifty pence a tin
Its strange times, its mad times we’re in
Can’t even go down the bingo
Can’t remember the last time I had a win
Hair like a Brillo pad, legs like scourers
Can’t remember the last time I plucked the hairs on my chin
It does this to you
All this social isolation
Wrapping clingfilm around a rebellious nation
And the government have this mental expectation
That we will be sheep
Clothed in the wool of allegation
Don’t go out
Wash your hands
Keep two metres between you
Do as we say, or we’ll impose a curfew
It’s just like the war
Except you don’t have to don your guns
And kill a visible enemy
We’re fighting something global we can’t even see
All we have to do is stay inside and watch the death tolls on TV
And I pray every day that one of those intensive care beds won’t be me.
Ooo loo roll
I’ll need that
Back in the war I’d wipe my bum with newspaper
The stories of the day plastered over my derriere
My neighbour popping by to see if I had some spare
And the air raid sirens would scream
And we’d be woken from our dreams
Of victory
Playing hide and seek with the bombs that rained down
Dot to dot on the roofs of the houses of our little town
Taking refuge in the shelters
Taking refuge in the neighbours
Taking refuge in the strangers
And though we were fighting for freedom
We were still free
Oh, tinned fruit cocktail
Will do for my trifle
Put it in my cupboard full
Of empty shelves
In my kitchen of a lonely life.
Better go home now
Better go home.

©2020 Sarah Drury

Privilege

Published on by Sarah DruryLeave a comment

I know there will be mixed feelings about this poem, but i was furious to learn that Prince Charles had received a test for Covid-19 when he had mild symptoms, when we have frontline NHS and healthcare workers risking their lives and not being able to get a test! Boils my pee!!

Don’t want a big political argument about this, we are all entitled to our own views.

Here’s a rant called ‘privilege’.

Privilege

Your privilege
Turns my blood
As cold as a cadaver in death
Lips blue
Tainted in death wish hues
With the colour of your politics
Doctors, nurses
Angels on the frontline
Your sacrifice isn’t adequate
For a vital test.

Heir to the throne
Cherished by the patriarchy
Whilst our health workers,
Heartlessly thrown
Between a rock
And a hard place
Courage doesn’t matter
When, placed between your lips
When you gasped at birth
Was a silver spoon
As you inhaled
The immunity
Of gentry.

Your privilege
Turns my blood
As cold as a cadaver in death
And I die
Of shame
At the injustice
Of society.

©2020 Sarah Drury

Sitting at the Doctor’s Surgery

Published on by Sarah DruryLeave a comment

I’m sitting at the doctor’s surgery

I’m sitting at the generic magnolia doctor’s surgery
Waiting to tell her my worries and thoughts
Because I am sick, surely soon I’ll face death
The Grim Reaper will be snogging away my last breath
And the demons and angels will be playing crosses and noughts
With the discount passport to a paradise Heaven I have bought
from a dodgy offer on Groupon

I’m sitting at the doctor’s surgery
Watching the receptionist with her graces and airs
The façade of the NHS
the administrative face that usually says ‘I don’t particularly care’
Watching the faces, the faces, the faces
The hues, the sizes, the myriad races
Who knows why they’re here, how they’re sick, who’s a dick
Who’s a racist, who acts like a nationalist prick
Yet you still see some English
Resentment seeping through their red and white bones
Wishing the migrants were fucked off back to their native homes.

I’m sitting at the doctor’s surgery
when my number comes up on the screen
I feel like I’ve won the lottery
I float through the double doors like a teenager having a wet dream
And its double jackpot with my doctor of choice
With her medical degree and her authoritative voice
I don’t know why, but I have no faith in doctors of the male gender
Why do the ladies always seem more knowledgeable and tender?
And is there a ‘Me Too’ movement in the medical world?
Or is it not time yet?
Has the notion of medical sexual abuse not yet unfurled?

I’m sitting at the doctor’s surgery
Lying on the ‘I’m vulnerable’ examination table
The only hands that have roamed my flesh in eight long years
Are working their magic, seeing if my heart is stable
Hands of middle age that fought for their equality
Hands of clever knowledge that have equal power on the Adam and Eve tree
Hands that prove that women can, and women can, and women can
And women can without a man
Winning races, blasting through misogynist traces
An army of female, heroine faces
I salute.

I’m sitting at the doctor’s surgery
Collecting my prescription
I don’t pay as I’m diabetic and that’s my benediction
How many people go without
Their madness meds, their wellness meds
The bones of their existence meds
Through poverty and hardship
As this country is in its austerity grip?
And i ponder over how many mentally ill
Are roaming the cities, crazy for want of an antipsychotic pill
And how many are living on the edge of a depression knife
And how many will take their life?
How many?

I’m sitting at the doctor’s surgery
Wondering how long will this go on?
How long will the NHS be a free commodity?
How long will it be before Boris starts singing Donald Trump’s song?
Our national treasure sacrificed through money and greed
By those that don’t give a shit for the proles who have greatest need
Let us never see the day.
Let us pray
Let us pray

©2019 Sarah Drury