conjunctivitis

Conjunctivitis

My heavy lidded red eye
Reminds me of the bull’s eye
I tried to dissect at school; but couldn't.
It was the lashes which made me heave.
Grotesquely, pathetically human,
Winking at me in its tray of brine.
The smell of dead eye balls lingered
In the class lab for weeks.

My swollen eye weeps all day,
Tissues like blotting paper
Soaking up tears.
While its twin stares, unmoved,
Embarrassed with this
Over spilling of grief.
Not sure what to do
With this surfeit of emotion.

It feels as though grit
Has scorched the surface,
Worse than having my feet
Desanded,
Or having a bath with
Sunburnt shoulders.
My lashes sticky and encrusted
Become inseparable in sleep.

I imagine an almost painless
Operation.
I tip my head and with a
Gentle nudge my wounded eye
Slops, blancmange like, into
A glass blue cup of eye solution,
Like a tired pedal boat
Bobbing on a sleepy lake.

I wait a while until the
The stinging ceases,
Let the lotion ripple
Its lullaby of love on all
My woe and weeping.
Patient, I will bide my time
For tenderness to travel and
Dissipate the darkness.

Gently my eyelid closes
On the empty socket,
Of a temporary night.


Jacqueline Pemberton