We have had many enthusiastic responses to the Poems for... project over the years, all of them unsolicited. You can see some of the snappier comments scattered around the site, but here are some of the longer ones.
Sir Michael Jay, KCMG, Permanent Under-Secretary, Foreign and Commonwealth Office, rtd :
“Diversity is an excellent theme, and particularly relevant to the challenges we all currently face in building a cohesive society..We would also like to order one set of your poster poems which we will use at appropriate FCO events..”
Sir Peter Ricketts, KCMG, Permanent Under Secretary, Foreign Office and Commonwealth Office :
“I remember well the success of the Poems for Europe project—and you might like to know that the same poems still ornament the walls of our staff restaurant here in King Charles Street….I wish you luck with your valuable and inspiring work.”
Susan Elizabeth, Director, Camelot Foundation, ex-Director of Grants, King’s Fund :
“I would have loved to come to the meeting, as you are quite right that I am a great enthusiast for the project and have a personal love of poetry. I was visiting an elderly cousin in hospital in Greenwich a few weeks ago and saw various of your poems on display around the corridors and lifts, which made me unreasonably excited and proud ! Unfortunately, I am not in London on that day so won't be able to take part....Amazing to see [the poems] in other languages and to know that you are developing a world-wide audience for the project. You deserve it!”
Sue Eardley, Chairman, Mayday University Hospital, Croydon :
“Just a note 14 months on from our launch with Andrew Motion of the "Poems for the Waiting Room" project here at Mayday Hospital. The poems are still up, and being changed around regularly, and patients often comment on them in passing. In addition, shortly after the launch event, we laminated several of the poems together with a "please self-clear this table" notice on the reverse and distributed them about the tables in the Burger King concession in our front entrance. To our surprise, most of them are still there, one year on, and clearly have been enjoyed by very many people. Thank you again for the initiative, and please keep us informed of any new schemes or if there is a way we can encourage other organisations to benefit from this great idea.
Susan Brown, Chair, “Arts for Health”, Milton Keynes :
“We now have poems in more than 85% of GP surgeries in Milton Keynes. I managed to get funding to employ an artist to visit GP surgeries and encourage them to display the poems and also to do some interactive sessions….[She] has also been into mental health day care centres and worked with patients and persuaded them to write poems for us with her assistance. Some patients have also been doing illustrations to accompany their poems…..So, thank you for sending us all those poems, I hope you agree, it has been a success story and we are delighted with the results.”
Sheena MacKenzie, Drug Link : 27.01.05
“…We provide support and advice to drug users and their families. This involves needle exchange, counselling, access to funding for rehab and being the first point of referral into NHS treatment. Our clients could benefit from the Poems in the Waiting project, are we eligible? are there any packs left? 16.02.05. “The poems arrived a few days ago, and we've just had a chance to look through them, They're wonderful. We've all been leafing through and enjoying them today. Once we've settled on a way of displaying them I will let you know. 11.03.05 We have had the poems in a binder for a while. Clients have been enjoying them. In fact I've just had a request that we change them over, as they'd been read so many times. This service user is now helping us choose the next selection. The poems have meant we have thought more about how our waiting room is, the message it sends and how valued peopel feel in it. Sometimes we concentrate so much on the quality of the service from one perspective that we lose sight of subtle ways in which we can value those who walk through the door…”
Diane Walker, Acute Day Therapy Service, Hartingdon Wing, Chesterfield Royal Hospital, Calow, Chesterfield, Derby :
“We have displayed the poems on 2x A4 boards in the main area where patients sit/socialise on the unit. These are changed monthly. I have also put 2 small notebooks up for any comments and/or suggestions and patients have suggested poems, brought poems in for display, many of which they have written themselves. In fact, one of the main outcomes from displaying the poems you forwarded to us has been that patients have often asked to have their own work displayed also...The poems have gone down well with staff (!)”
Lynne Darnell, Mental Health Promotion Officer, MIND in Camden :
“There has been a very positive response to the presence of these rich and varied poems located just over the water dispenser in our lobby area ! We’ve also put some on display down the stairway, so you are met by poems as you enter the building...We are very grateful to be one of the organisations receiving the poems free of charge....”
Dr Cock, GP, Gateshead, Tyne and Wear :
“Every so often I get a little note from someone saying ‘how nice to see poetry’ and in fact, as a result, three or four patients have brought in their own poems and we have put those up too…We try to unmedicalise the waiting room. We have the medical posters and leaflets in a corridor outside instead.”
David Gelipter (GP, Sheffield) :
“Thank you so much for the two collections. They are simply wonderful. I plan to try several of your suggestions, and perhaps others too. I wonder if any of my patients might be inspired to add their own poems. I shall try to feedback some responses to you in due course….”
Julie Jefferson, Practice manager, West Gorton Medical Centre in Manchester :
“One of the GPs had heard about the scheme and we felt it would make a change from the magazines and all the medical material and the tons of leaflets we have about various services. I read through the poems myself and I think they are brilliant – some of them were very amusing. We have a multiethnic population here and it’s excellent that there is something for the patients to read in their language.”
Dr Nitin Gambhir, GP, Glasgow :
“I must congratulate you on running such an innovative idea within the healthcare setting. I am a locum GP working in Glasgow. I have been born and brought up in India and work in a multicultural and multi-ethnic city like Glasgow. I cannot see a better place than Glasgow where your work will be truly appreciated. Also I feel General Practice is the closest we can get to patients hearts and I am confident these poems will strike a chord not only among patients but staff alike. …I am proposing to give the practice [the full set] as a starting token and hopefully bring some fullness to the waiting room.” [A year later] : They are being routinely displayed in our waiting area and we have received some very good feedback about them. I thank you once again for making such a useful contribution to this aspect of healthcare.”
Brigid Falconer, Umbrella, Mental Health Crisis Night Shelter, Islington :
"The clients are extremely enthusiastic about the poems, and have already selected several for the walls. They have already planned a Poetry Evening at the CNC for next Sunday, which will include some of the users reading their own poetry, as well as poetry readings from the packs...I've been very pleased with the response, which has been even better than I anticipated. The poems have brought up a lot of positive emotions, laughter and discussion. I've also been very impressed that many people who are sometimes nxious or quiet in the communal area are confident when they read the poems out to the group…”
The Ultrasound staff, Maternity Scan Dept, PAMU, Royal Bolton Hospital :
"We work so hard we're dizzy,
'Cos our waiting room's so busy,
Our patients wait for hours
And they only look at flowers
So please please send your rhymes
To help them pass the time."
Margaret Usher, Seaton Hospital, Valley View, Seaton, Devon :
“The poems are often read aloud to our clients in our Day Care Departments who often have Parkinsons or are also in various stages of dementia. It triggers lively discussion on poetry learned by them and this often develops into an interactive poetry circle."
J.U. Birmingham :
“Dear Rogan Wolf, I first came across Poems for the Waiting Room when my husband was in St Mary’s Hospice Birmingham over 2 years ago and it has taken me till now to be ready to get in touch. Reading the poems they had on display was certainly all part of the supportive, caring atmosphere of the Hospice. Through this personal experience I should like to be kept in touch with your work.”
JP :
“Dear Mr Wolf, I have recently seen a Poems for the Waiting Room presentation folder within a palliative care setting which provided a great source of comfort for many visitors. May I take this opportunity to thank you and all the contributors. Are these poems available for other health and social care settings?”
Jeni Sharpstone :
“I thought you might like to know that some of your splendid collection are gracing the walls of the Victoria Hospital in Castries in St. Lucia in the West Indies. My husband is working out there, and is so pleased to be able to put a bit of pleasure on the walls. I thought you might like to know how well travelled they have become! I will let you know the response.”
Cathy Smith Soho Rapid Access Unit (for drug users) :
“I wanted to give you some feedback on 'poems for the waiting room'. The service users have been reading through the folder and a couple have asked for copies to take away with them - Sylvia Plath's 'Mushrooms' is the most requested. One particular client wrote a poem and put it in the folder following the death of his partner - I'm delighted that he felt able to share his emotions with the team and his peers. Your scheme inspired him, I think.”
Andrea Lee (Mrs), Physiotherapy Receptionist, Warminster CommunityHospital :
"I have received the new Poems for… collection and I am totally delighted with them. They have attracted a lot of interest among the staff, all picking out ‘favourites’. Some of the scripts are beautiful in their own right, even without the translations. One of the most striking aspects is that no matter what language and ethnic background, our hopes, feelings and dreams are the same. Thank you once again."
Dr. Sharif El-Leithy, Senior Clinical Psychologist, The Traumatic Stress Service, Clare House, St.George's Hospital, Tooting : "You might remember that some time ago you sent us the initial collection of poems for our waiting room…. We have continued to display the poems in the waiting room, in a table-top frame, and we try to change the poem each week. The feedback from our clients has been very positive, and on a number of occasions the content has triggered a conversation about an issue that has had therapeutic value in the context of our work.
I noticed recently that you have now published a collection of bilingual poems. About half of our patients come from other countries, generally as refugees fleeing torture and persecution. We also undertake most of our work with this group through interpreters, and probably work across 15 different languages on a regular basis. The collection seems particularly relevant to our patients, and indeed may be a really positive way of helping non-English speakers who attend to feel a sense of welcome and inclusion, through coming into contact with poetry in their language whilst waiting. As such I wondered whether you might be able to send us a copy of the collection…. Many thanks."
Lidija Ivanovska, UK Embassy, Skopje, Macedonia :
“We managed to photocopy all the poems on A3 poster paper and they turned out great. We pasted them on little wooden houses in the park where the Europe day was organised. The Ambassador was pleased with the result. Unfortunately we cannot use them again, as we had English weather on Sunday and they got wet. I plan to make more new copies and put them in the waiting /public areas in the Embassy. I put the "Lift" poem in our lift and the reactions of the staff were very interesting! It is quite a new thing for most people here.”
