Shloka Ramachandran explores her lived experience of chronic pain through a series of four poems, the first pair composed in the aftermath of surgery and the second experimenting formally with the villanelle.
measures
I measure my pain in moments,
a doctor with a clipboard,
a detached third party, jotting down notes:
and how long, pray tell, can the patient go on
today? and today? and today?
shakespeare spoke of tomorrows,
but todays are the real thorn in my side.
ten minutes pain-free, twenty minutes at a stretch:
the poet, who once spoke of walking,
now measures her life in stuttering footsteps
shakespeare said out, damn spot,
but I am more worried about hips than spots these days
measured in seconds,
in footsteps,
in leaning against walls
ten minutes pain-free, but it’s always nice to put your feet up
the poet, who once thought she understood illness,
is left at the mercy of a ball and socket joint
I measure my pain the way scientists measure chemicals:
I do not understand enough about pain, or scientists,
or joints, to make these metaphors, to write this poem,
to know how to measure out anything at all
Prometheus
The birds are in their trees,
the toast is in the toaster,
and the poets are at their windows.
‘Monday’ – Billy Collins
The poets, as Billy Collins would say, are at their windows
Except for me. I am in a hospital bed, drawn and quartered.
Waiting for an eagle to whom I owe several lakhs
To peck at my organs until I’m okay. Surgery, from the Ancient Greek,
A practice involving a major incision. I have paid for this eagle,
And I will awake once my liver has been pecked out.
I’m drawing out this metaphor, dear reader, but I assume you,
If you are familiar with me, are rolling your eyes.
Tell me, when will it stop hurting? When can we brush over it?
Routine, borrowed from the French:
It’s all nothing to worry about.
It’s a Thursday. Let’s get to work.
The good kind of pain
The good kind of pain
Has a slow onset
Like an early monsoon rain
It settles over you night and day
It stays up for you, like it’s trying to say
Relax: I’m the good kind of pain
There are measures to keep it at bay
There are measures to ensure you’re okay
It’s calm, slow: an early monsoon rain
A blaggard, a bastard, a ne’er do well
You’ll be grateful for this: time will tell
That it was the good kind of pain
Relax, take it easy, come out of your shell,
This is okay, even though it will soon be hell
For now, it’s merely an early monsoon rain
It comes slow, slow, slow
And chooses to never go, go, go
The good kind of pain
Is sneaky, like an early monsoon rain
march poem
march clings on with stubborn fingers
we’re all left behind to revel in the flowers
it’s a new day but we are the same as ever
there are blooms everywhere: yellow, pink, white
when you’re trapped, it’s hard to remember the sunlight
march clings on, stubborn, with grabby fingers
it’s burning, new, visceral, raw
we wrench hope from gloom’s tempting maw
it’s a new day: we are the same as ever
the days are getting longer; the sun’s setting late
it’s all a new kind of joy, the kind that’s wont to break
march clings on with ever-stubborn fingers
everything is fragile, happy, awful, bright
the world is changing! what a goddamn delight!
a new day, but we’re just the same as ever
soon all we’ll have left is bright songs and tired verse
reassurances: it feels bad now, but it used to be worse
march clings on with stubborn fingers
it’s a new day but we’re the same as ever
About the Author
Shloka Ramachandran is a writer and postgraduate researcher currently doing a PhD at Royal Holloway, University of London. Her research interests include illness and disability studies, the walk, postcolonialism and the Romantics. Shloka has previously completed an MFA at the University of St Andrews. Her PhD is a critical intervention into the walk poem as a Romantic inheritance, looking through a transhistorical lens at how the walk poem is altered by a poet’s limited access to place and how the concept of the imagined walk can navigate these barriers of access.
About In Practice
‘In Practice’ The Polyphony’s creative practice research project, showcases multi-modal creative engagement with the lived experience of chronic illness, disability, caregiving and health from a range of creative practitioners within and beyond academic research. Founded by Aly Fixter and Grace Brimacombe-Rand, they wanted to bring their own creative practice and academic engagement with creative texts to the medical humanities digital community and foster new connections. If you are a creative person who explores their lived experience of health or the body through writing, art, photography, or any creative methods, please get in touch to share your work with The Polyphony’s audience.
