ZIMMER FRAME
by Thomas Hoskyns Leonard
I recover in grief on my free NHS Zimmer frame,
as the pain, the morphine and the paracetomol go away
As faithful comrades remain faithful,
And faithless relatives in denial of gay, crazy 'sub-human' me
Emphasise their callousness
My life, rebuilt in 2017 not yet shattered one more time,
Though Lear's destiny
May yet be faced,
Perchance a third daughter, may yet as my granddaughter emerge
To protect me against the the lifetime once concealed foe
Who triangulates them all.
My collapsing leg outside the Mosque,
As I from the literary reading in the Botanic Cottage return
The calls for help from my flat,
The responsibility which my Home Counties next of kin averts.
A second fall when I rush to pee; a shattered knee
The six burly paramedics who carry me down the stairs,
Eight days in the Western
As they test for pre-existing NHS conditions,
With visits and phone calls from by Scottish comrades,
Though nought from May-accursed England..
And now the last infinity of my life to face.
While I assert the truth and maintain the grace.
NOTE ADDED 8/10/2022 THE 'ONCE CONCEALED FOE' MAY WELL BE IN
THE NEXT GENERATION, OR A COMBINATION OF THE TWO
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