Connect
MJA
MJA

Plainsong for a daughter III

Jacinta Le Plastrier
Med J Aust 2015; 202 (2): 107. || doi: 10.5694/mja14.01322
Published online: 2 February 2015

For Coco


In the ward again, at fifteen, then sixteen
she lies frozen.
At tilt with her world
this arrival again, bleached with trauma.
She ghosts into
the opiating realms of unexplained fevers.
Notice
among the alleys of drips, hooked
to beds or wheelchairs
the complex faces of parents with their damaged children.
At the Royal Children's Hospital Parkville,
what might divide us, distinctively
in the cumulous gift of living.
She is strange colours,
hosted by angels undoubtedly.
They patter here, yet darkly
to wrestle and reckon young mortalities.
Tested are the doctors' reasons.
She sleeps for days, in this clock-time perversion.
My own attention, edged lucid, prayer
shaped to her breathing.

  • Jacinta Le Plastrier1

  • Melbourne, VIC.


Correspondence: jlep@netspace.net.au

Author

remove_circle_outline Delete Author
add_circle_outline Add Author

Comment
Do you have any competing interests to declare? *

I/we agree to assign copyright to the Medical Journal of Australia and agree to the Conditions of publication *
I/we agree to the Terms of use of the Medical Journal of Australia *
Email me when people comment on this article

Online responses are no longer available. Please refer to our instructions for authors page for more information.