Ward D9
(For Linda and Helen)
We are a murmuration of rose-ringed parakeets,
plumed in our floral nightdresses, flashes of colour.
Turning our heads sideways to catch each other’s
eye, as we rise and fall on our beds unable to keep still.
The nurses visit us for our inexplicable laughter
and ability to talk. Having taken the swoop,
and arrived here by escape or accidental release,
we are still on the loose: perching,
wisecracking,
from a source not quite understood.
We did not choose this, me and the other
two women who delight in answering back.
Neither victims or heroines. On this cancer ward
between the sheet changing and the drips,
we remain, flightless, piratical
look down from the windows, shameless
still hoping for air and spreading our wings.
From deep in our feathers we mutter:
Give us a chip! Turned out nice again!
Pieces of eight, pieces of eight.
Clare Crossman lives outside Cambridge. She has published four collections of poetry with Shoestring Press Nottingham. The most recent being The Blue Hour ( 2017) She is working on her next collection.