I wonder how to name the hospital.
It is inside a huge whale’s tummy in the North Sea.
The mattresses were torn and old, gagged the gateway of the tummy.
They all wore the red striped shirts and pyjamas, black boots and loose socks,
White dressing gowns and the striped dresses of the older physicians and dead guests heaped in piles.
Moulds on the walls of the whale’s gut were visible,
The ceilings of the outer arch inside the tummy were as sooty
as in the ship without the chimney standing outside the whale,
Just opposite his eyes.
The smell of the expired liquids produced the age-old odour.
In fact, a friend was one of the patients.
The whale with its big tummy
Stood alone and desolate in desperation,
With its God-forsaken look.
The whale’s tummy could swap its identity with a prison.
A prison from the medieval age, closed space where everybody knew everybody.
My friend was stressed out by the darkness of the tummy full of shouts and screams.
Unknown existences were unwelcoming.
They cried out throughout the days out of pain and despair.
The rooms had bleak views counting the waves.
But alas! Couldn’t be opened due to heavy gust of winds.
I had no idea why he had been put into this room with men going through
nostalgic feelings, swearing tones, and askance for fantasia.
The strikes were on, doctors seemed to be runaway fugitives.
The whale’s tummy was taken over by randomly hired warders.
The tyranny was overwhelming, declared no room for anyone else.
The friend was still in his high spirits,
Though asked for the home-cooked food., was allowed to eat
the mild fish curry with well-roasted potatoes.
He was provided with fresh clothes after a cool shower.
He sighed and gave his bitter smile.
Roommate with his weird beard, looked unruly,
Sometimes was begging a pound or a fantasy from other patients in the same room,
refusing to eat the hospital food.
The recent storms inside the seawater made them awful, tried to vomit.
The whale and the people inside it were listening to the wind.
The whistle of the forceful and violent wind stirred few moments in them to burst out into their pathos.
The motionless, ever hungry animal squeezed the human beings inside,
They suffered sleepless nights, started to pray to the God.
Doctors cancelled appointments.
They waited for their quota of alcohol and cigarettes instead of food.
The night was endless and most enduring.
They couldn’t find any further meaning to their lives.
They flocked together and collected all their courage to reach the head-attendant’s room
for the keys to the upper deck inside the jaws of the whale.
They rose up in desperation to find freedom.
Did they really want to find freedom?
Even if they died in freeing themselves!
Perhaps instead of fed by the whale itself,
As the founder of the hospital, I granted them a final leap into the cold sea.
Or they wished not to die in hospital.
But to die in their own beds was a very powerful desire.
Remained a dream or the ultimate fantasia?
Nadini Sen