22
Gone to sleep, worn
out like every other evening
Awake with a
feeling; the five inch screen screaming
Bomb
I hear the people
sing as the souls slide away
Don't look back in
anger, I heard you say
It's hard to heed
the advice, but I've heard it twice midlife
Flip chart tallies
mapping out the slice of the surgeon's knife
Kids
Close calls, the
sense of regret, cocooned strife sat around the ventilator
It could have been
me, It should have been me, prayers to the maker
I've got a heart and
I'm human and the sea of white kameez
Signs with red and
black, a river down the Hill in the evening light
Past the tape, and
trucks and satellite receivers to the Regiment
Flower field growing
around those others who cannot be named
Love
Chris Chapman, 5th
June 2017
After reflection on the events of the 22nd May 2017 for a couple of
weeks I wrote this poem on the afternoon of the 5th June 2017.
It was based on a
few of the things that have really stuck with me over these days.
A woman, Lydia
Bernsmeier-Rullow starting a spontaneous rendition of Oasis’ “Don’t
Look Back In Anger” in St Ann’s Square. After a shaky start, the
rest of the crown join in.
Hearing the story of
homeless men Chris Parker and Stephen Jones who in the immediate
aftermath ran into the arena entrance and helped the injured. Then,
in a couple of days the public had crown funded in excess £100k for
them both.
Then driving home a
day or two after the bomb, on Cheetham Hill seeing a river of Asian
men, presumably many of whom would have been Muslim, all wearing
pristine white kameez, walking down the road. Many of the procession
carrying the now common place “We ❤️ MCR” signs, making
their way into Manchester to pay their respects.
Siting in the Silver
Command room at work while on call and taking the time to really see
the flip chart paper sheets wallpapering the room detailing all the
patients still in hospital, how many are still in critical care, how
many on the wards. Other flip charts with the emergency theatre
number, showing how many times each patient has been back to theatre.
Many had been multiple times in the immediate few days afterwards.
Hearing of the guilt
of a teenager whose Mum was killed and Dad was still on ICU at MRI
two weeks later. How going to visit the Dad was so hard due to the
guilt. If I hadn’t been there, they wouldn’t have been waiting to
pick me up.
Finally, going to
see the sea of flowers filling up St Ann’s Square, around the
monuments including the monument of the fallen soldier and his
comrade from the Manchester Regiment during the Boar War.
