Dreams and memories

Dry Stone Walls

Dry stone walls lie crumbling;

At the year's end,

Each stone marks one long month passed.

Here, you stumbled on a frozen ground

And stretched a hand for steadying;

Here, I held you till we brought the night

To weld the hollow chinks as one.

There, you leapt in yielding chase

Across the moorland to my hot pursuit.

And there, we lay in breathless wonder –

Shadowed by these stones from prying spring.

That rock, heavy with a rimey moss,

Gave itself to cushion your frail face

Through all of summer;

These were pulled by argument,

Ripped from their ancient bed

To spoil an autumn hill-scape.

Weakened, gaunt, exposed, grey winter's blast

Loosened to prise free these last

Until a sheltering sheep might lean them down.

Now, with the year's death, falls my love.

In badly weeded borders, bare with neglect,

written at Haworth, 1 Jan 1989 JHM

For some weeks I have had bad diarrhoea, going up to five times through the night, and of a type I am reluctant to describe in a homely blog. After some attempts to see my GP, I phoned the oncology nursing team at Addenbrooke's. They got me back onto the Oncology Day Assessment unit next morning, and the doctors arranged a follow-up scan. 

Then on Monday afternoon (who said the NHS shut down for a funeral bank holiday), they phoned back with an appointment to see the consultant on Wednesday pm. Such a rapidly arranged appointment will alway trigger apprehension, in this case warranted. The whole team pushed passed Ann into the tiny room: registrar, nurse and the consultant, who was clear and direct. The melanoma has spread with more secondary nodules in the lungs, and a large new growth in the liver. She bluntly confessed nothing more could be done, but they would arrange to liaise with the unit at St Nicholas Hospice for any additional support. They would also write to the GP requesting an appointment with the community dietician to try to reverse my weight loss. Also she will start large doses of steroids to dampen down the diarrhoea, assuming it to be bowel inflammation as a late consequence of the immunotherapy I had had, even though this stopped in April. Ann insisted on some sort of prognosis, which we have not been given, and the nurse suggested it might be twelve months, so I'd better make the most of each day. Ann suggested we might hire a boat, since we got rid of ours. That cheered me enormously, and I dreamt that night of visiting various boatyards to see what we could get. It was more exciting than a sexual dream (which I don't have anymore), for though Ann probably has ambitions to cruise down a river, my dream took me out to sea and to some of the ports we used to visit.

Thank you Kaz and Ben!!

Yesterday I am feeling stronger again, perhaps braced by a good dream, and I was able to take Ann to her hairdressers and walk the dogs, then take a light lunch in the Swan garden in the in the last of the autumnal warmth. Later Edwin took us over to Bury for a takeaway, followed by a lively game of "Go Fish". Today I had to go back to Bury to help Edwin sort out a problem with his new phone, then tonight, on grandson Luke's birthday, Kaz and Ben sent a most wonderful and moving gift of a champagne to celebrate our days together. Thank you both so much for sending such a joyful message into our lives. We particularly remember Luke's birth twenty years ago, as we were on holiday in our caravan in Wales that night when the biggest earthquake for many years struck Gwent, tilting the caravan and causing Edwin to fall our of his bed! Happy birthday Luke!