Taguig Pateros Hospital Emergency Room, August 2014 Poem by Hugh Mitchell

Taguig Pateros Hospital Emergency Room, August 2014



Framed portraits of the president
and local mayor beam down from walls
flaking for lack of paint.
Lined up on trolleys, here they lie - the poor.
Some have been here for days
with cardboard strips for mattresses
and saline drips.
The lights stay on all night
dried blood smears the enamel of a bed
a pot of urine lies upon the floor -
no-one removes it.
Two doctors hold an X-ray up
of two unequal lungs.
They shake their heads.
I see the shrivelled owner
staring into space.
Waiting for what?
Treatment? A cure? Or death?
I think he knows.
A wheelchair brings a lolling man
'He isn't breathing'.
The screens go round
but I can see his feet
jerking as doctors try to save his life.
A sheet's drawn over him
'Brought in dead.' they say.
I learn the lesson once again:
The poor die slowly and in pain.
Meanwhile, skyscrapers sprout on the horizon.
The president and local mayor smile down.
A better future?
Possibly for some.

Tuesday, October 7, 2014
Topic(s) of this poem: deaths
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Hugh Mitchell

Hugh Mitchell

Coventry, England
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