Ten Types of Hospital Visitor

The first enters wearing the neon

Of virtue.

Ceaselessly firing all-purpose

At everyone

She destroys

In the breasts of the sick,

Who realize

That they are incapable of

Her ferocious goodwill.

Such courage she

In the face of human disaster!

Fortunately, she does not stay long.

After a speedy trip round the

In the manner of a nineteen-thirties

Showing the flag in the Mediterranean,

She returns home for a week- With luck, longer -Scorched by the heat of her own

The second appears, a melancholy

Of theological colours;

Taps heavily about like a healthy

Distributing deep-frozen hope.

The patients gaze at him cautiously.

Most of them, as yet uncertain of the

Of heaven, hell-fire, or eternal emptiness,

Play for

By accepting his

With just-concealed apathy,

Except one old man, who

With newly sharpened hatred,`Shove off!

Shove off!`Shove… shove… shove…

Off!

Just

The third skilfully deflates his weakly smiling

By telling

How the lobelias are doing,

How many kittens the cat had,

How the slate came off the scullery roof,

And how no one has visited the patient for a

Because

Had colds and feared to bring the jumpy

Into hospital.

The patient's

Ice over.

He is

In lobelias, the cat, the slate, the germ.

Flat on his back, drip-fed, his

The shade of a newly dug-up Pharaoh,

Wearing his skeleton outside his skin,

Yet his wits as bright as a lighted candle,

He is concerned only with the here, the now,

And requires to

Of nothing but his present predicament.

It is not

The fourth attempts to

His aged mother with light

Menacing as shell-splinters.`They'll soon have you jumping

Like a gazelle,' he says.`Playing in the football team.'Quite undeterred by the sight of

Of plaster, chains, lifting-gear,

A pair of lethally designed crutches,`You'll be leap-frogging soon,' he says.`Swimming ten lengths of the baths.'At these unlikely

The old lady stares

At her sick, sick

Thinking he has lost his reason -Which, alas, seems to be the

The fifth, a giant from the

With suit smelling of milk and hay,

Shifts uneasily from one bullock

To the other, as though to

Settling permanently in the antiseptic landscape.

Occasionally he looses a scared

Sideways, as though fearful of what

He may blunder on, or that the

Might suddenly close in on him.

He carries flowers, held lightly in

The size and shape of plantains,

Tenderly kisses his wife's cheek- The brush of a child's lips -Then balances, motionless, for thirty

On the thin chair.

At the end of visiting

He emerges breathless,

Blinking with relief, into the safe light.

He does not appear to

The

The sixth visitor says little,

Breathes reassurance,

Smiles securely.

Carries no black passport of

And visa of chocolate.

Has a

Of clean washing.

Unobtrusively stows

In the locker; searches out more.

Talks quietly to the

Out of sight, out of earshot, of the patient.

Arrives punctually as a tide.

Does not stay the whole hour.

Even when she has

The patient seems to sense her there:

An

The seventh

Smells of bar-room after-shave.

Often finds his

Sound asleep: whether real or

Is never determined.

He does not mind; prowls the

In search of second-class, lost-face

With no

And who are pretending to

Or read paperbacks.

He probes relentlessly the

Of each complaint, and is swift with

Dilutions of confidence as,`Ah!

You'll be

Before you're better.'Five minutes before the bell

Visiting time, his friend opens an alarm-clock eye.

The visitor checks his watch.

Market day.

The Duck and Pheasant will be still open.

Courage must be

The eight visitor looks

More decayed, ill and infirm than any patient.

His face is an expensive grey.

He peers about with antediluvian

As though from the other

Of time.

He appears to have risen from the

To make this appearance.

There is a whiff of white flowers about him;

The crumpled look of a slightly used shroud.

Slowly he passes the patientA bag of

Home-made biscuits,

A strong, death-dealing cake -`To have with your tea,'Or a bowl of fruit so

It threatens to

His glass fingers.

The patient, encouraged beyond measure,

Thanks him with enthusiasm, not

The oranges, the biscuits, the cake,

But for the healing

Of someone patently

Than himself.

He rounds the crisis-corner;

Begins a

The ninth visitor is

The tenth

Is not usually named.