Tact

It was no contest
game over
a no brainer
cute four-year-old needing a liver transplant
versus
white middle aged, middle class, medical specialist.

The television interviewer
young
and pretty
with Parisienne lips
and refugee hips asks, no demands,
no shrills
why, when suitable donors die every day
the little girl cannot have what she needs – now.

The lived in face
stares directly at the camera
“ you must understand
that the people who end up here
left home, normal, walking, talking, laughing people
sometimes, that’s as little as one hour ago
often, they look exactly the same
but
they are clinically dead or
soon will be.”

A nod to a room peripheral to the camera
“and I have to go out there
and tell the families –
it’s never easy
but sometimes … most times,
it is simply out of the question, to put the question, “ can we have the spare parts.”