Essay - Corpus - Page 21

Words in times of loss

27 February 2017 Leave a Comment

Barbara Snook

During my life I have had more opportunities than most to witness people struggling with words to express sympathy. Not only did my parents die well before their time, but I have lost a son, a husband and a daughter out of the natural order of things. I do not presume to speak on behalf of all bereaved persons, but for me, I appreciated people taking the time to say something – anything. There are no answers or magic words of comfort that take the pain away, but it has always helped me when people open up a conversation about my children or my husband.

Speak up! Poems about deafness

27 February 2017 Leave a Comment

Ruth Arnison

Melbourne on the quiet

a 10-day holiday
with broken hearing aids

Therapy dog: Jack and the SPCA Dog Squad

20 February 2017 3 Comments

Joanne O’Carroll-McKellar

I have always wanted to be a member of the SPCA Dog Squad. I’ve owned Curly-Coated Retrievers since 1995, but my previous Curlies, for various reasons, were not suitable: too bouncy, dribbled, didn’t like children. And then, two years ago, I adopted Jack. I soon realised he was a perfect mix of cheerfulness and calm, an important quality for a therapy dog.

Our first ‘job’ as a member of the SPCA Dog Squad, with our coordinator, was to the children’s ward at the Dunedin Public Hospital. Who was more nervous, Jack or me? It was hard to tell.

Emergency poet!

13 February 2017 Leave a Comment

Deborah Alma

Emergency Poet is a piece of theatre, a quack doctor show and also at its heart, a vehicle (pun-intended) for sharing and disseminating poetry. I travel to city centres, festivals, libraries, hospitals, conferences, schools – I have even been to a couple of weddings! My last ‘emergency’ call-out was to a conference of psychotherapists and psychiatrists for the UK National Health Service.

Dressed in a doctor’s white coat and stethoscope and accompanied either by Nurse Verse or a Poemedic, I travel in my vintage 1970s ambulance, which is still fitted with its original stretchers and medical equipment. It’s a mix of the serious and the theatrical. There are skulls, jars of eyeballs and other body parts inside the ambulance, and under an attached awning there is a ‘Cold Comfort Pharmacy’ with Nurse Verse dispensing poems-in-pills for various ailments, including internet addiction and anxiety. There’s even some poetry Viagra.

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Diary of a concussion

13 February 2017 1 Comment

Liz Breslin

November somethingth, 2016

Who’s the Prime Minister?

Why are you even asking me this? That guy in America? Let’s talk about him. Trump. No, that’s the wrong one. What’s the question? The Prime Minister. The smiler.

John Key?

I don’t mean it to come out like a question. I get another in return.

What date is it?

What the heck? I’ll just check my screen. Except I definitely don’t want to move off this floor. I’m sure it’ll be OK if I just say the day instead. It’s not like this is a test.

Sunday?

Our cadaver is male…

6 February 2017 Leave a Comment

Isabelle Lomax-Sawyers

The Anatomy Lesson of Dr Nicolaes Tulp. Rembrandt, 1632. — *The Anatomy Lesson of Dr Nicolaes Tulp*. Rembrandt, 1632.

Our cadaver is male. He was old when he died. I don’t remember his face.

There are maybe ten of us in our white coats. We crowd around the table where he lies in an open black body bag, his head resting on a block of wood. We drape a paper towel over his genitals. We have seen human remains before, single limbs unpeeled to varying degrees. He is whole. He is the first one that is ours.

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