I've never had a female G.P. before,

in fact I rarely visit a doctor.

I find them wrathful and jealous gods

whom I can't be bothered appeasing,

especially when I feel poorly.

Yes, I've feigned stress and depression

to get time off work

and tried to acquire free Viagra.

But who hasn't done that?

Today I'm here to establish

my fitness to foster children once again.

 

There's just the three of us -

me, her and the computer.

She's not unattractive, in profile,

and when she finally turns her face to mine

she waves an ancient, scruffy card

bearing real joined-up writing.

You've only ever had bronchitis and a vasectomy.

It may be more approbation than scoff,

still I wish I were more exciting.

She listens to my chest and I cough.

I don't remember the bronchitis.

1955.

I was one year old, we lived in a Prefab,

my father smoked 60 Park Drive a day.

I'm older than that yellowing card.

 

Good grief ! she shrieks, your height has increased

from 167 to 176cm. in the last 4 years.

Viagra can do wonderful things, I say,

but I think you'll find your colleague

mixed up his sixes and sevens;

and it was 2000 not 2006.  

30 years of deciphering doctor's writing

wasn't spent wholly in vain.

 

So at your last appointment Dr Radley

prescribed you Viagra. 

He did, though at £6 a tablet

I skipped the local chemist

and went private, so to speak,

asked a friend to bring some back from India.

Oh dear! They put all sorts in it over there. 

It's pink and tastes funny.

Really? Shall we have a .....Oh, you mean the Viagra!

Yes.

And has it done any good?

It's been brilliant, thanks.

Oh, splendid!

I shall have to put you down

as impotent, I'm afraid.

I take it like a man.

And what do you do for exercise?

I smile at her and she smiles back.

 

There are small traces of blood

in my urine specimen.

She recommends a cystoscopy,

as a precautionary measure.

I know about cystoscopy,

have had the procedure

described in graphic detail:

the tube inserted into the eye of the penis

which eventually opens out, umbrella-like.

I don't like to think of that umbrella.

I've seen the hurt that umbrellas can inflict,

particularly where it's pissing down.

A real man doesn't carry an umbrella, I joke,

then politely but firmly decline the assistance.

 

She's hurt.

It feels as if I've rebuffed her

and just when we were getting on so well.

I leave quickly lest I'm smitten

with sores and afflictions;

before I shrink even further

in her estimation.