COUNTY NURSING HOME
(Hali Hammer)

I once worked in Activities, played music, set up crafts
At the local County Nursing Home where I was on the staff
And I came to know the patients when their lives were near their ends,
There were some I helped, & some I watched, & some became my friends
Some were brought there by a family who still visited & cared
But most were confused and all alone with the fate that left them there
And some were poor, and some had had their money, but their health
Had failed, and now the hospital was heir to all their wealth
But all of them were there at last, to last till they were gone
And we tried to bring some happiness to the County Nursing Home

I played bedside music for the ones who never left their beds
And old songs for those so confused, their lives swirled in their heads
I chorded the guitar so John could strum after his stroke
And sometimes I’d just sit & visit with those gentle folk

Ella was 100 and she had more lines than face
But you still could see her beauty and you still could feel her grace
At chorus I’d pass instruments out, get to her at last
“Be a Beatnik” I would tell her, hand her bongos and she’d laugh
She came from Olive Branch, a town now buried for all time
When they built the reservoir for the big city’s main supply
She told me of her husband who’d died young and was so kind
All her memories were neatly framed and hung straight in her mind
One day when we were talking, she turned to me and said,
“You know, when I think of myself, I’m 40 in my head
And sometimes I see a mirror and I give myself a scare
When I look at that old woman that I see reflected there.”

Estelle sat in her Gerry chair and stared with eyes so wild
And she never would respond whether you talked or laughed or smiled
And one day I played dominoes with the patients on C-3
I passed the pieces out and then I rolled her next to me
“Should we play the 3 or 5?” and she would give the slightest nod
Then she would travel far away and go back to her fog
But at the end, she touched my hand, her mouth moved so slowly
And she said, “Thank you so much for playing dominoes with me.”

But Gladys was my favorite, with no legs she’d wheel about
And help feed other patients when the dinner trays were out
She’d grown up black in a county most conservative and white
And we would talk of many things, of politics and life
From the March on Washington to honor Martin Luther King
I brought her back some posters and I told her everything
We talked of how the government’s injustice was a crime
And she’d voted every year since Harding, seen it all the time
And when I left that job I still would visit with my friend
And when I moved so far away, our friendship didn’t end
I still have the birthday card she sent signed simply, “Your Gladys”
And I wrote till one returned marked “No longer at this address”

I’ve had many occupations, but there’s none by far I’ve known
Where I learned more about people than at the County Nursing Home.