Interpoetry


THE PYRAMID-SELLER


A young Arab appears in front of me
blocking my view of the Great Pyramid. 
He wears a pair of jeans and a white shirt.
Where are you from? A tone of brotherhood
rings in his voice. He’s noticed my brown skin.
I see trinkets and T-shirts on his arms.

‘England,’ I reply. I have an uncle in London,
 he says. ‘So, you can visit him?’ He shakes his head.
I’ve a family, see, my daughter, my son,
she is nine; he’s seven. He shows me the photographs. 
I notice her rush of black hair, his toothy smile. 
‘Good,’ and I begin to move to re-join our group.
 
Please, I want to give you this, he pushes
a plastic-wrapped garment towards my hand. 
‘No thank you’ and I leave. His eyes darken
and follow me for minutes. Then he walks away.

Sitting in the coach I think of that man, his kids:
would he tell them about the tourists as they lie
tucked in their modest bed? That he met someone
of his own colour who came from England? Would he 
stay awake dreaming of Big Ben? That one day he
would see it in flesh as I have done? Would he
feel betrayed that I didn’t buy; I didn’t help out?

We pick up speed. The sun beats down on
the Great Pyramid and the people at its feet. 
The stone-monument gets progressively smaller
like in a picture-postcard. But three faces enlarge -
the Pyramid-seller and his kids - and nudge at my guilt.


A SHRIEK  


Every so often I hear a shriek -
idle screen showing a haunted house
where creatures flap, fly and shriek - 
my PC’s warning to be switched off.

But I didn’t hear her silent shriek the day 
she said she was tired and exhausted
and said it again weeks and months on.
Nor as she lay in a hospital bed attached
to machines with needles and tubes. Then 
in the Oncology clinic waiting her turn
to be wheeled in to the Treatment Room 

and the specialist- nurse preparing 
the new drug, and she watched the liquid 
drops slowly from the bag into her vein 
as if they have all the time to play. Finally 
in her own bed tied to bolus morphine drip
words struggling to shriek but lost in whispers.

Now I hear it sharp as a whistle, I would press
a key or two, banish that picture, stop the shriek:
my hearing restored at least to the chips.




NUMBERS

999 calls brought in three Cardiac Arrests.
GPs have to be told of the deaths.
In my office I pick up the case notes
and read the names and note their age:
70, 60 and 35. My eyes halt on the last.

The first doctor I ring isn't surprised.
He was half-expecting the news.
Angina, heart-bypass. Just marking time.
Then the next - a 60-year-old on the mend.
Her fractured leg was just out of cast. 
Must be a dislodged blood clot -
Pulmonary Embolism, we speculate.

I pause before making the third call.
‘Found hanged.’ Paramedics thumped,
and shocked his muscular chest.
We did our best.  But his heart refused 
to start like the engine of a burnt-out car.
‘On Prozac, and supposed to be doing well.’
I kept seeing the circling grey mark,
a coiled snake round his neck. 

Dusk rolls on to night. I switch on my car
and head home through near empty streets.
Speedometer needle swings as I gather speed.
Thirty-five.  Sixty.  Seventy.