Notes on the State of Adult Social Care - 1. The Standard High Backed Chair; Adjustable - Without Wings
By thanksfortheparakeets@gmail.com
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She sits in the Standard High Backed Chair; Adjustable - Without Wings.
She's an old bird now, and there'll be no more flying
the clipping of the years has seen to that
she'll never be no sweetheart in a ball gown
not now
the backs of her hands are marbled blue and purple
the muscles of her bladder flaccid
she dribbles
smells of hospital kitchens
is barely human-looking
not now
that human and woman means
that glossed, bronzed, skinny little thing
you are surrounded by on screens
at all times.
We have forgotten the sharp joy of her birth
the tears of her mother. Her wail and bawl
as the cord was snipped clean.
We have forgotten, because her human-ness
is smeared with Sudocrem and pureed carrots
the image of her human-ness is ugly and clumsy
the plastic beakers, piss-soaked sheets
milky eyes, trolleys, hoists, beeping alarms
the false teeth -
she has hidden and can't remember where.
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Comments
This has got clean down to my
This has got clean down to my core and it hurt. Her vulnerability is so starkly conveyed. Your discomforting spill on social care standards is really sharp, then you strip right down to humanity to expose that in-built recoil in all of us, that disgust mechanism that makes us naturally not want to touch our elders. That thing called caring that seems to have packed up and left at a universal level. This left me flinching. It's a killer of a poem, discomforting, and a meaningful exercise in the bullshit of social care rhetoric.
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Very moving, so much so that
Very moving, so much so that I felt compelled to write something for the first time in what seems like an eternity. Better out than in, and I'm grateful that my Mum's care-home is in good shape compared to many. Thanks, Marion.
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Moved by this too, the
Moved by this too, the frailty and the detail that only someone who works in the 'caring' environment would know. One thing some respite care places and residential homes do is to have photos on the wall of the residents when they were young... it might just stop someone from objectifying for a second.
Not sure of the last two stanzas, they don't seem as finished as the rest and the overt political message, I feel, is unneccessary. Everything is converyed by the images.
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