Doctors

He sought to protect me from life,
To build a wall around me
And a nursery-rhyme world inside.
A child again I laugh and play
Where no harm can reach me.
'Its better this way' he said
'Look how happy you are!'
Merrily, merrily playing in sunlight,
Life is but a dream...

I am enwombed, entombed no longer
I have opened the garden gate
And I have seen the Fall.
Ugly words in ugly days -
'Two killed in street attack'
'New child abuse scandal inside!'
This world is not a nursery tale
Not safe nor pleasant nor just.

It is terrible.

Though my heart splinters
With every needless death and harm,
Though innocence is ravished
And happiness wears mourning clothes
Yet the freezing air of reality
Is more bracing, more 'healthy'
Than the mottled cloying sickness
Of the pills that cocoon me.