A crabbit old woman? (FEATURED CME TOPIC: THE OLDER PATIENT).

A Crabbit Old Woman?

What do you see nurses

what do you see?

Are you thinking

when you are looking at me

A crabbit old woman,

not very wise,

Uncertain of habit

with far away eyes,

Who dribbles her food

and makes no reply,

When you say in a loud voice

"I do wish you'd try"

Who seems not to notice

the things that you do,

And forever is losing

a stocking or shoe,

Who unresisting or not

lets you do as you will

With bathing and feeding

the long day to fill,

Is that what you're thinking,

is that what you see?

Then open your eyes nurse,

you are not looking at me,

I'll tell you who I am

as I sit here so still:

As I use at your bidding,

as I eat at your will.

I'm a small child of ten

with a Father and Mother,

Brother and sisters who

love one another,

A young girl of sixteen,

with wings on her feet,

Dreaming that soon now

a lover she'll meet:

A bride soon at twenty,

my heart gives a leap,

Remembering the vows

that I promised to keep:

At twenty five now

I have young of my own

Who need me to build

a secure happy home,

A woman of thirty,

my young now grow fast,

Bound to each other

with ties that should last;

At forty my young sons

now grown and all gone

But my man stays beside me

to see I don't mourn,

At fifty once more

babies play around my knee,

Again we know children

my loved one and me.

Dark days are upon me,

my husband is dead,

I look at the future

I shudder with dread,

For my young are all busy

rearing young of their own,

And I think of the years

and the love I have known,

I'm an old woman now

and nature is cruel,

'Tis her jest to make

old age look like a fool.

The body it crumbles,

grace and vigour depart,

There now is a stone

where once I had a heart:

But inside this old carcase

a young girl still swells,

I remember the joys,

I remember the pain,

And I'm loving and living

life over again,

I think of the years

all too few--gone too fast,

And accept the stark fact

that nothing can last,

So open your eyes nurses,

open and see,

Not a crabbit old woman

Look slower--see ME.

Kate

(This poem was found in the locker of a patient who died in a
long-term-care hospital ward in England. The patient was thought to
have a dementing illness.)