Each ward was possessed of its luminaries

and on Elizabeth Woodville, stuffed

with delusional wizardries, knight’s

move thinkers and neologists,

Joan was the apotheosis -

the lunatic’s lunatic.

 

Outshining Howard Sargeant,

alias Mikhail Mikhailovic,

the Russian sleeper who had seen

Kennedy’s assassin: transported – by spaceship! –

from Dallas, Texas, through the madhouse portals

where the facial alteration

was performed so many lives ago.

Defeating Herr Freitag, ex prisoner-of-war,

whose mission it was to exhume the corpse

of Sir Winston Churchill, thus releasing

 the souls of fallen comrades.

Who on countless sorties had been intercepted,

spade upon shoulder, marching purposefully South

until the advance was halted

and the white flag raised in surrender.

 

None were more completely out to lunch as she.

She told me when we met:

“I am The First Lady of Woodville and rule

from this partition to that partition”

indicating the edges of her domain,

twenty yards either side of her bedroom.

“And you, are you British? Are you one of us?

I think not! We’re not what we were once

but we surely haven’t sunk that low!

I shall call you Eric. Good day.”

 

Eric I remained, one of a galaxy

from past and present, real and imaginary,

populating a virtual reality,

a second life before its time.

Miss Garside, Uncle Len,

Doctor Masood, Mister Trigg,

Lady Gertrude, Percy Panter,

Pecksniff, Donaldson,

Tall Defective-Looking But Normal David,

whose identity was ever

a matter of keen conjecture.

Then the varieties of apple:

The Plump Red Apple, The Small Sour,

The Rosy-Cheeked, The Ginger,

The Impertinent and The Bad.

One female staff member

was awarded the sobriquet of Max Bygraves.

I felt fortunate enough to be Eric.

 

We were but minor characters;

the name in big letters, the top of the bill

was the omnipresent Vera.

Vera inhabited The Sound Air,

an intricate complex of tubes and wires –

“You’re not clever enough to understand, Eric” –

perched opportunely above Joan’s kingdom.

Theirs was a strained relationship;

we heard but one side of the dialogue:

Shall I be able to get in the bath?

Will there be a dress that will fit?

Which foot shall I lead with when I exit my room?

And the question we most dreaded to hear:

Shall I biff? Shall I biff?

Answer me, you bitch! Shall I biff?

A primeval growl by now,

at odds with tweed skirts and sturdy shoes.

 

The equilibrium of the universe

was delicately balanced and wholly dependent

on remaining just so by an unseen line

traversing Joan’s skull at a precise angle.

Vera’s unflagging vigilance held it in position;

she was rewarded with various rites and placations .

Joan could be seen at certain fixed hours,

waving hands over tables, pictures and chairs,

muttering imprecations, glancing scowls

at the great unknowing.

We learnt swiftly to leave

her ministrations undisturbed –

to interpose was to court a good biffing.

 

Each morning Joan stepped out

and stopped the traffic, weaved and waved,

blew kisses at the fawning minions,

before returning, her pockets bulging

with milk and chocolate stolen

from the sweetshop Indians.

Joan was bullet-proof,

too well-spoken to reprove,

her obvious good breeding beyond

the reach of care plans and medication.

 

Joan was a madwoman 24/7,

never giving less than 100%.

Younger clientele are aimless,

you’d no longer call them patients,

burnt out so quickly, no commitment

to the cause, always in and out of doors.

Time has seen the back wards progress to history

and Joan is with us no more.

 

Sometimes I stare at the ceiling of my room

and wonder whether Vera

has another who can hear her,

or if indeed the universe is doomed.