Honies, I'm home... and totally overwhelmed by all the love and concern I'm receiving from all you precious, precious people. Turner you KNOW you are an absolute STAR for standing in the gap for me: lunch together somewhere posh for you soon and another bottle of champagne! :)) xx Honestly, I really can't believe what I have been reading (WHO are they talking about?!) and I feel awful for "putting you all through it" for me. But, truly, I have never felt so much warmth and appreciation and makes the experience somehow "worth" it... hope that don't sound too weird, but you probably get my drift. Heigh ho, GOT to rest heaps and heaps, so reviewing (sob!!) will be a bit slow, but a couple of hospital poems to empty out of my "holiday" bag meanwhile... no sand this time, just surgical dressings and pain-relief! Hmmm.... :)) Diagnostic results this coming Wednesday and THANK YOU for your much-needed prayers. I love you all. Kate xx

BEINGSTALK


Embalmed in iodine,
swaddled in surgical dressing;
saline in one arm,
bloodied serum oozing
from my side.

My body now a foreign land,
alien territory
bounded by unknown
and horrified perceptions.

I escape, my fertile being
growing skywards,
a shooting umbilicus
from soft belly
of undaunted hope.

High above body's cancerous cage
my self is at play:
in a broad and spacious place,
Big Friendly Giant
strokes my hair like a harp
and smooths my tarred feathers.

Here I become large
with the expectation
of Spirit's miraculous
golden eggs,
knowing fairytales are
for real.