The Sick Child

Cherry

By Philip Sidney

Fri, 25 Sep 2015
  • 1625 reads
11 comments
 

She hadn’t noticed

sickness settling in

 

daylight had her skipping

over warnings, too caught up

in the green/gold of living

to think of night.

 

Not until she was in bed

did that foul familiar breath

stroke her cheek and whisper

promises of what would follow.

 

She watched the wall

move in close

suck her into

a peppermint

stick grip

‘look behind the stripes,

behind the stripes,’

the slick sick voice told her

‘you know we’re here,

we’re always there

waiting for you.’

 

Her answer was a moan

as her tongue had grown

and lolled in doggish drool

no one would hear her call

 

dream and memory, the same

she stood on the stair of a twisted tower

looked through the glass at people in white

her dress was too, she was pretty

they’d said, that was good

she had guessed

but not good enough as

there was singing, high singing

then burning, burning, hell

hell was here, no, hell would be worse

but that smell, was it flesh?

meat on a hook, she saw it up close

the head of a goat

its lips had moved

then mouths in the wall

telling her, scolding her, talking

and talking, she must understand

but the weight in her head

shook it all up

and the colours too

kaleidoscope bright, too bright

she wanted cool

 

green and blue

 

the smell of lemon

 

tang on her tongue

 

but not yet

not yet

night stretches on.

 

Certificate 12
Poem

Comments

Submitted by tibi popovici on

 
Terrible nightmare, that's so close for a child, close to an ending. Very well crafted.
T.

Submitted by Rhiannonw on

I remember getting the same nightmare every time I got a temperature when a child.
One of my children was struggling each time he got a temperature and I suddenly realised with him it was memories of coming round after his tonsil operation when they wouldn't allow the mothers to be there that was recurring at that time, (he'd had to go back in for gromets, and I saw some children coming round and realised how they felt with the puzzling pain) and explaining that to him helped him a lot.
Made me wonder where the unpleasant idea of the people in the stripes came from.
But the waiting for 'cool, green and blue, the smell of lemon tang on her tongue' somehow sounded as if it was comforting even if still waiting for it. Rhiannon

 

Submitted by Philip Sidney on

Thanks for reading, Tibi and Rhianon, those childhood nightmares never quite leave us.  Your poor son Rhiannon!

Submitted by Philip Sidney on

Thank you for the cherries. :)

Submitted by Bee on

Reading this made me feel progreeively sicker as it went on. It's that insular feeling that no one will hear.  It's horribly well done. 

Bee

Submitted by celticman on

hits the surreal and makes it too real. 

 

Submitted by loquaciousicity on

Limbo-like...

disturbing...

nice!

Submitted by blackjack-davey on

great fever dream with Munch illustration. The peppermint stick and the stripes reminds me of convicts and that vibrant, stripey wallpaper that really hurts when you're hungover-- Jean Rhys mentions it in After Leaving Mr Mackenzie and the voices are between the bars, behind the walls. You catch the magnified boredom of the sick room, too ill to move your gaze is focussed on one patch for too long.

 

Submitted by VeraClark on

This reminded me of the first time I had pneumonia and hallucinated with fever. Distinctly remember flying up to the ceiling and seeing the Anaglypta ceiling close to my nose. It's a wonderfully distorted perspective, you give a magnified lens to ordinary senses and the personification of the virus/ disease is a chilling one.

 

Submitted by jeand on

Hi Helen

This poem is so filled with anguish - so vividly described. So well done.

Jean

Jean Day

Submitted by Philip Sidney on

Thank you Jean.