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oard in the ward teaching room 21 . I asked the following two questions and
for any other comments:
―What do you think of these poems? Any comments please‖
―What place do you think poetry may have in nursing?‖
In the fourth co-inquiry meeting (12/5/05), I shared my reflections of this
process with the co-inquiry group. The poems had been covered over by
other notices. No-one wrote on the comments sheet and I thought this
could mean no-one was interested in them. However, I have learnt not to
jump to conclusions becoming aware of some of my assumptions during
this inquiry and thus learning to be more patient with others‘ responses.
Consequently, I asked staff on the ward what they thought about the
poems which resulted in a number of conversations about the emotions
experienced at work. I half expected the nurses to consider me as ‗new
age‘ and a ‗bit bonkers‘ for introducing poetry but many of them felt the
poems resonated with their own experiences. Again the poems
encouraged the telling of several similar personal experiences. The
Ageism and The Wounded Nurse poems sparked most response from the
staff on the ward while the PhD of Gossip appealed because of the
humour. About a year after I had worked on the ward I bumped into a staff
nurse who asked me where the Ageism poem had been published. She
had forgotten I wrote it and thought it was a published piece. She told me
she could still remember how it questioned bed blocking and made her
feel differently about the process.
During the conversations with ward staff I was told the poems had
provoked feelings of frustration and anger because of the tension in never
having enough time to talk and listen to patients. Two nurses said the
poems had made them realise how much they felt ―dumped on‖, how they
were always the last person in the chain; that they didn‘t have time to go
21 The poems included: The PhD of Gossip, Ageism, The Wounded Nurse, The Washing
Machine Leak and Moaning Minnie. (I had not written the Neck Cancer poem by this
stage).
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