Cancer
When you have cancer
The world becomes smaller.
The world becomes hospitals.
Chemicals and Nabilone.
Hope and dreams to confess.
Free for you from the NHS.
So the world is smaller
Yet its also bigger.
Because the fight that you make
Is the same all over the world.
Unless its America.
Dollars mean care.
We get it for free.
Because some one made an NHS dare.
Which means free care.
Aneurin Bevan
We we’re the lucky ones, still are.
In 1948 he had a dream.
We can be saved from pain and suffering.
It sometimes seems.
Not all of it….
But some of it.
He dreamed.
And now if you get cancer
The care is free.
The diagnosis is free.
The NHS is free.
The diagnosis is the same all over the world.
Unless you live in the third world.
Then you’ll just die.
And not know why.
We don’t need insurance
To fight this awful plight.
And the doctors and nurses
Join your fight because the NHS.
Was someones dream.
And its their dream.
But now its becoming someones scheme.
And cancer will become even harder.
And people will live less,
And die more.
Because we’re forgetting
A national pact.
1948 National Health Service Act.
Cynthia Buell Thomas
Tue 5th Mar 2019 10:26
A conversation with you must surely swing in wide arcs, challenging and informative, and stimulating. You are a thinker - sometimes a gift; sometimes a burden.
Thirty-five years at sea must have provided many solitary hours for self-probing in an 'ocean environment', its sheer immensity ideal for self-examination fundamentally personal and honest. I admire your journey and your conclusions. And your reading! Especially the dictionary.
I don't think I ever quite accepted how ill I was this past year. And could still be. Semingly, not now. Cancer is such a personal affliction. But, there's definitely more than one way to be 'eaten up alive'. I consider myself truly blessed (if I may use that word with very wide scope) and I am so grateful to the Christie and the NHS.