Phone Call

Emotions dial straight to turmoil, a phone call from the hospital.

The fact that my phone rang at all was unusual, but the display says ‘Hospital’.

Not the phone call i was half expecting at all, that in itself was a nuisance

Waiting on a phone, staring at a screen they all are ‘nuisance calls’.

So, not the ‘desperate’ friend I’m expecting in need of ‘helping out’.

A reckless button push and I’m connected to the medical world outside.

Then, on the line a female with accent refined, 

after ascertaining my name straight to business,

invites me to decide on a date and time i could make,

so allowing them to operate surgically on me.

I am alone i have Cats,

I suddenly feel hot and cannot concentrate.

I was expecting someone different, if at all

An addict in fact with a rather different kind of call.

“The twenty first at ten?

“No, okay that’s fine, the twenty eighth then at nine.

I draw breath to answer this request and somehow,

This is taken as a yes,

In fact as if I have whole heartedly acquiesced

“Yes? Okay that’s fine”

“ We shall see you then Mr Whitter, goodbye”

Now this was probably just one of many,

such calls in this lady’s working day.

For me maybe one or two within any given year,

Her razor-sharp pronunciation coming to my ear loud and clear made me feel as if I was obliged,

Obligated to please her.

Perhaps she could seek a more lucrative telephone career.

art by Paul Warren