Lymph Massage Poem by Keith Shorrocks Johnson

That life should be so wonderful

That I have a carer who loves me.



She leans across me as I sit up in bed

And follows the instructions from the hospice

About lightly massaging - saying ‘one thousand' -

Rotating her fingers according to the manual.

It is quite counter-intuitive - that such little pressure,

At such light touch, should have any bearing on outcomes.



And I start to think of things that bring tears:

I remember being terrified and unwanted as a boy

When we had moved to the farm with my stepfather -

And how we were overwhelmed when he became sick -

With me as a five-year old watching him heaving blood

In the back toilet from a perforated peptic ulcer.



And of being mystified as the dog was shot -

Brought from the pen in the old pig sty at the back

And set to wander to the abuse of the human beings

Before it was brought low in the driveway with a 22 -

And we returned to the kitchen to drink tea

Beset by so many fears and self-recriminations.



And me desperate for any kind of place or standing

That would help me survive the harvest of 1949.

And the incident of the open-top cart behind the tractor

When I was placed on the flat bed among the stalks and chaff

And the tractor pulled away - only to see the massive end-gate

Fall around me - missing me - but dashing down my toast and honey!

That was funny!



And come the autumn, of me riding the tractor draw-bar, harrowing

Across the pitted and corrugated fields - anything to be part of things.

But bloody dangerous! Sorry but this must stop. Rewind these memories!

Slightly tearfully, I thank my lovely carer and apologise for being such a nuisance

‘You are worth it', she says - my tears welling - ‘I'm so very sorry', I sob

‘You are a lovely man', she says - and what is below the surface begins to give.