No Ordinary Day
On the ward, they allocate a bed
by the window. Mum phones out
of the blue with an updated list
of the dead and diseased.
I tell her I have miscarried.
This goes unacknowledged.
A midwife squeezes my hand
as the blood pressure cuff
releases its wheezy grip
perforating the silence
stretching out like a scream.
A tea trolley trundles by.
Swollen bellies wait for reassurance
doing the rounds with a Doppler.
I’m promised a commode. I gush
and leak through two large pads.
Through brand new satin pyjamas,
the midnight blue of concealment.
She says it’s raining here;
I’ve washing out,
I must go.
Dandelion clocks somersault
past the streaked glass.
I make a list of things to burn.
© Lorraine Carey
Lorraine Carey’s poems are widely anthologized and published in The Stinging Fly, Panoply, One, Gyroscope Review, Allium, Magma, Bracken, Poetry Ireland Review, and Rust + Moth, among others. Her craft often explores and reflects on ecocentrism, landscape, belonging and species decline. An Agility Award recipient, she was selected for The Freedom To Write Project 2024, and is working on a second collection.
The Loch Raven Review 