大象传媒

I was working as a nurse at the Wellhouse Hospital, now known as the Barnet General Hospital during the war. We nurses were always hungry as we had very little food and when flying bombs were on the rampage we would lay over the tops of the cots near the windows to protect the babies. I have many moving memories of the wounded soldiers I worked with. The poem below explains some of my feelings;

The Colour Blue

How many people in Barnet
Have heard of the Wellhouse,
Have you?
It made my life, controlled my life
By the colour blue

From an eager teenage trainee nurse
To an ancient old codger,
Yes, that's me.
Memories come crowding in
Of what there used to be.

So you say

The colour blue, why the colour blue
From around green fields could be seen.

I say

Broken bodies, pathetic faces,
Of soldiers who'd fought for the Queen.

"Oh, not the war again",
Comes the wellworn phrase, boredom creeping in.
I am determined to end my poem.
So listen and take rest of this in.

So why the colour blue?

Blue boys we called the soldiers
Dressed in hospital blue
Wandering wards and spacious grounds
In traumatized condition too.

Blue wore the matron and sisters
And included little old me.
Blue were the faces with despair
As now with blue memories.

So

The Barnet General Hospital,
I'm told is now its name
Of where Oliver Twist started out
And Dickens added to his fame.

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