Canteen Talk 1975 Poem by Terry Collett

I placed the Camus book
face down on the canteen table

other nurses sat over the way talking
looking at some magazine

smoke rose from a cigarette
put on the side of an ashtray

I sipped my coffee
and looked down
at the bumf on the back cover
of the book
The Outsider
by Albert Camus
and other black print

I felt an outsider
outside the circle
of behind the back talk
the chitchat of this and that

I thought the mentally ill patients
more desirable company
with their smiles
and odd stares
and drooling mouths

I thought about Natanya
the night before
us at it in the bed

she holding me
about the waist
me looking down at her
at her black hair
her eyes gazing

the bed rocking away
she maybe thinking what
her kids might think
might say

a nurse got up
from the table
and laughed about something
then she went on her way
out the door

the other three sat
and talked about her
probably or more likely
me.