'Behind a Royal Blue Door' by Maria Thomas

we walk down corridors, grey lino deadening our feet, grey walls deadening our thoughts, past royal-blue door after royal-blue door, empty vending machines yawning as we walk down corridors, through electric doors, past rows of royal-blue chairs, past rows of royal-blue chairs, past posters that shout GIVE BLOOD, STOP SMOKING, LOSE WEIGHT, we walk down corridors, down corridors to a royal-blue door with a royal-blue plaque that reads Mrs Susan Walker, Consultant Neurosurgeon, and we walk through this royal-blue door, where the sympathetic silence is lit by the lightbox glow, where Mrs Susan Walker, Consultant Neurosurgeon, waits antiseptically to tell us there is nothing else to do, nowhere left to walk, and we say nothing, we have nothing left to say