#matron
I hid in the work shed
when I heard the male matron
calling my name
(the big ****
I had a class jar
filled with earth
and black ants
and watched them
make tunnels
and **** any who
were odd ones
or stragglers
and he called out my name
Benedict where are you?
I kept silence
stifling the urge to laugh
until he'd gone
then I sneaked out
and went a different way
and after an hour or so
he'd say
where have you been
I've been looking for you
everywhere?
and I said
o I was in such
and such a place
and he raised his
bushy eyebrows
like waking up
sleeping caterpillars
and said
but I looked there
and I said
o must have just
left then
and once
in the staff room
having morning
or afternoon tea
I'd have a copy
of Ezra Pound's Pisan Cantos
open and read
to myself
while others
(women) chatted
about this and that
like o that Mrs Biggins
she went a wet my shoes
or that Mr Gubbin
went and touched
my backside
as I went past
and I thought
how hard up does one
have to be
to do that
I mean her backside
of all backsides
although Mrs Bee
had a nice one
I guessed
imagining waking up
to it most mornings
like her husband
must have done
and Win said
where have you
been hiding out
that twat's been
looking for you?
has he?
I said
well there's a thing
then I put away
the Ezra book
as the bell
(on the wall)
began to ring.
Feb 3, 2016
Feb 3, 2016 at 3:41 AM UTC
Matron at the Lodge
said she wanted me
to see a person dying
to prepare me
for what might come.
She took me to a room
on the upper floor
where an elderly lady
lay on her bed.
It was a woman
I knew called Ethel
she lay there eyes closed
her breathing heavy
with what Matron called
a death rattle.
I stood there
in a dark room
with just a lamp on.
I waited listening
to the breathing
looking at Ethel
Then the breathing stopped
and just silence.
Matron felt for a pulse
there was none.
She's gone
Matron said.
She showed me what to do
to prepare the body
for the undertakers.
She closed the jaw
and bandaged it up.
She tied the legs together
and placed the hands
over the breast.
I watched and helped.
Poor Ethel
and her eternal rest.
Jun 3, 2025
Jun 3, 2025 at 4:26 PM UTC