I see strewn, dank debris in hollow rooms
tattered patterned curtains, dipping
to black floor pools, mildewed lockers
splayed on crumbly carpet tiles;
curled-up edgy truths un-swept out.

In a clearing, bed-frames jangle-joust
a bewildered wheelchair idly rusts,
in the nurses’ room pill-white coats hang
slack, dusty ghosts of hectic people
gone and not come back.

There’s a sick-pink corridor, punched along
with dark-green doors whose gaping mouths
hang open, showing padded stapled walls;
etched souls’ canvasses, yellowing, exposed.

No more needling medics wander,
or worse, no bored, clock-watching screw,
in the corner of a ward, I see an Exit sign,
its light not on, they've all gone home –

I think of you.