Vernon Scannell
Doctors
Doctors walk swiftly down corridors and wear
white coats with stethoscopes dangling either from
their pockets or worn like drab chains of office.
Men and women, they are all young, well under
forty, and all of them are very handsome.
When they smile, mischievous at the pretty nurse
or reassuringly at the aged patient,
it is with teeth perfectly white and even.
These are the doctors we see on our screens
and they do not much resemble the ones we meet
in shabby consulting-rooms whose smiles, if there,
are rather tired and probably display teeth
not quite the white of fresh aspirin as they
enquire about bowel-movements, waterworks
and known allergies to antibiotics
before tapping out nostrums on computers.
Other doctors exist or have existed
of course but these, too, aren’t likely to be seen
in TV soaps wearing dangling stethoscopes,
for these are the Teachers, Doctors of Music,
Philosophy, Literature and Law, many
quite famous and revered though not for white smiles
or dark curly hair: Doctors Johnson and Donne
and the composer of Rule Britannia, Arne.
There are also Doctors of Divinity
and Doctors of the Church, Aquinas, Anselm,
Teresa of Avila, Francis of Sales,
to be revered though not carnally desired.
But when molested by pains and lack of breath
it is the unglamorous, overworked man
or woman we seek out, not the beautiful
or the holy who would frighten us to death.
Page(s) 92
magazine list
- Features
- zines
- 10th Muse
- 14
- Acumen
- Agenda
- Ambit
- Angel Exhaust
- ARTEMISpoetry
- Atlas
- Blithe Spirit
- Borderlines
- Brando's hat
- Brittle Star
- Candelabrum
- Cannon's Mouth, The
- Chroma
- Coffee House, The
- Dream Catcher
- Equinox
- Erbacce
- Fabric
- Fire
- Floating Bear, The
- French Literary Review, The
- Frogmore Papers, The
- Global Tapestry
- Grosseteste Review
- Homeless Diamonds
- Interpreter's House, The
- Iota
- Journal, The
- Lamport Court
- London Magazine, The
- Magma
- Matchbox
- Matter
- Modern Poetry in Translation
- Monkey Kettle
- Moodswing
- Neon Highway
- New Welsh Review
- North, The
- Oasis
- Obsessed with pipework
- Orbis
- Oxford Poetry
- Painted, spoken
- Paper, The
- Pen Pusher Magazine
- Poetry Cornwall
- Poetry London
- Poetry London (1951)
- Poetry Nation
- Poetry Review, The
- Poetry Salzburg Review
- Poetry Scotland
- Poetry Wales
- Private Tutor
- Purple Patch
- Quarto
- Rain Dog
- Reach Poetry
- Review, The
- Rialto, The
- Second Aeon
- Seventh Quarry, The
- Shearsman
- Smiths Knoll
- Smoke
- South
- Staple
- Strange Faeces
- Tabla Book of New Verse, The
- Thumbscrew
- Tolling Elves
- Ugly Tree, The
- Weyfarers
- Wolf, The
- Yellow Crane, The