HIV Ward Poem by Peter Skrzynecki

"Life as nowhere else and a people apart."
- Dostoevsky, The House of the Dead


Transferred from Haematology
lo the HIV Ward
because you contracted "golden staph"
and now pose a risk
to other leukaemia patients
undergoing chemotherapy —

you've adapted to your
new "second home"
faster than anyone
thought you would:

to the smaller, familiar
environment
with its goldfish tank
and Bobby Goldsmith Foundation emblem
hung like a welcome sign to the ward.


2
The staff are friendly
beyond duty —
helpful, co-operative,
always ready with a smile
or cheerful word:

Emma, Cathy, Dean, Paul -
night staff, day staff;
week after week.
How do they keep
their sanity
with everything they
hear and see?


3
The address "E10 West"
has become
almost synonymous
with our own at Eastwood —

that small section
on the tenth floor
of RPA -
overlooking St Andrew's College,
set at the edge
of playing fields,
among acres of camphor laurels.


4
Medical procedures
have become
second nature to us —
in-patients and day-stay patients alike:

portacath, cannula,
Ganciclovir, Intragam —
words for equipment
and chemicals
used to keep you alive:

common talk, now,
like saying sugar, salt or tea.


5
Sitting, there, beside you,
often it's too easy
to fall asleep or say nothing - to seem rude or indifferent:
but we've been through it all
many, many times
while waiting for your
bone marrow transplant
to graft —

for a new world
to take over your body
so the old can be defeated,
left behind.
The doctors say we must
wait, be patient.
In the end your strength
and courage will win.


6
Looking out the window
I can see
mountains of foliage
stirring in the breeze.
I can feel their coolness on my skin.

With its blue-and-white cross
St Andrew's flag
waves below me like a sign
of surrender
from an army hidden in the hills.


(Bobby Goldsmith Foundation - charity which supports children
suffering from lukaemia
RPA - Royal Prince Alfred Hospital in Sydney)