A Rest in the Grace of the World – Madeleine Walton
7: Yesterday’s Memories – Sue Shearer
8: I am Still Me – Sue Shearer
9 Final Days (i) I open the back door but…
10 Final Days (ii) She was the woman who...
11 Final Days (iii) Now silence is her torment…
12: Where is the Hope? – Linda Furbey
13: Nowhere to Go – Jude Gwynn
14: Owl – Jan Outram
Her Boys – Jan Outram
15: Summer Holiday – Anon
16: Cancer Ward – Anon
17: The Wounded Self – Neil Simpson
18: A World Without Young Men – Neil Simpson
19: Timely Rest – Neil Simpson
20: Mis/Connections – Debjani Chatterjee
21: There were Times ... – Debjani Chatterjee
22: Daibutsu – Debjani Chatterjee
23: A Bird’s-Eye View – Debjani Chatterjee
Foreword
by Briony Broome, Chair of Sheffield Carers Centre
This anthology is a celebration of everyone who is part of our community of unpaid carers. These individuals offer their time, energy, and love to those in need, with little or no financial reward. Their experiences, challenges, and moments of quiet strength are at the heart of this collection; as they bring together stories and poems that reflect the complex nature of caring.
The pages include reflections on the resilience and the unique bond shared between the carer and the cared-for person. Their voices offer a brief but powerful glimpse into a world that is too often overlooked.
This collection honours the experiences of carers and raises awareness of their invaluable contributions. It is a testament to the power of words to connect, heal, and shed light on the lives of those who give so much of themselves in silence.
On behalf of everyone involved with Sheffield Carers Centre, I offer our sincere thanks to all the writers who contributed their work. We hope readers find the collection entertaining and helps to spark conversation, inspire creativity, and remind us of the power of storytelling.
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Sheffield Carers Centre is a local charity that has supported thousands of unpaid carers in the city over the last 30 years. This has been achieved by offering an extensive range of services tailored to meet the unique practical and emotional needs of the individual carers and the cared-for person.
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To order a printed copy of this anthology please visit our website: www.sheffieldcarers.org.uk/anthology-2024
A Room of My Own
I have a room of my own. My partner Janet sleeps downstairs with her carers and has done so for the last four years. My room is messy and overfilled.
I want it to be tidy and a pleasant space to be in. But all day I am busy downstairs caring and then when the night carers come, I fall into bed exhausted.
I know I would feel better if my room was nicer. However, the problem is I know that what I really want is to be back before November 2019, before Janet had her brain injury. I want to be sharing my bedroom with my partner of 35 years.
by Madeleine Walton
Where’s Freedom?
Away from the house
Where enforced detainment prevails
Where I dream to be free
Where I get up when I please
Where I walk, read and eat when I want Where I no longer feel trapped
Where I am no longer a carer
by Madeleine Walton
The Past and the Future
I miss the past
Walks in the hills
A life full of art
Space to reflect
Bring me a future
Full of hope and happiness
With no caring duties
Where I choose what to do
by Madeleine Walton
Everyday
Daily, I make tasty soup for a cheap but nourishing lunch. Every morning, I chop onions to sauté with carrots, celery and garlic, adding lentils or cauliflower or whatever vegetables need using up. Before liquidising I add stock. Our vegan gluten-free daughter devours it. And so do Janet and I.
by Madeleine Walton
For our Grandson
I look forward to Tuesdays
On Tuesdays you come to our house
Your smile always lights up our home
It is impossible to be sad in your presence
‘What are you doing Nana?’ You constantly ask This Tuesday you found tadpoles in our pond
You delighted in their movement
You were totally present In the moment
by Madeleine Walton
A Rest in the Grace of the World
When I feel overwhelmed I open the back door and step into the garden. I sit on a bench, admire plants while watching birds. I do my breathing exercises. And for a few minutes I escape, leaving caring inside. Then I return, my resilience recharged.
by Madeleine Walton
Yesterday’s Memories
Yesterday’s memories
Are but experiences of time
Brief moments in an ocean of thoughts
Washing ashore like debris after a storm
The dreams and nightmares of the past
Long forgotten memories
Resurfacing to drag you down Into the murky depths of yesterday.
But should we let the past lie?
Should we lock it away?
Or should we face it head on, Knowing that the past and all its secrets Can no longer hurt us?
There is no need to run away in fear For he is no longer chasing you Or capable of hurting you.
Tomorrow brings hope
A new dawn brings light into the darkness
Today is now And I am safe.
by Sue Shearer
I am Still Me
Your words try to hurt me
To make me ashamed of who I am
Your lies spat like venom
Try to change others’ minds
To turn them against me
I’m doing it because I’m your friend, you say But I am still me.
Your actions try to bully me
To make me doubt myself
To change who I am And how I look
To make me what you want me to be
I’m doing it because I love you, you say But I am still me.
Then I found the one Who didn’t want to change me
I like you because you’re you, you say And I am still me.
Then friendship turned to love
A love that’s strong and true I love you because you’re you, you say And I am still me.
by Sue Shearer
Final Days (i)
I open the back door, but no welcome awaits
I walk into the kitchen, but the cooking stove is silent
No pilau rice, no fill a bowl dear and sit at my side
Her chair is empty at the dining table, and I quickly go past
The door to the hallway I swing open and no shadow or salaam
The clock suddenly chimes, her favourite timepiece, and I listen for her voice, a strong, commanding tone
Quickly girl, where have you gone? was my expectation
I turn the knob of the living room door and immediately
I’m eerily greeted by an empty room
Even the TV doesn’t speak, the clock ticks faintly and lets out a sigh
But I close my eyes and now she gives a sweet smile
I take a seat beside her and feel the warmth
I take her hand and caress it gently
The clock chimes and the moment has passed when a tear leaves the eye.
by Sughra Begum
Final Days (ii)
She was the woman whom all feared
A determined, obstinate, feisty lady and head of us all
The room filled with her talking and us poor listeners feared: what’ll leave her lips next
Many monologues, stories, tales of insignificance and remember this! she would urge
Sadly, I feared the worst, when the breakfast was untouched
The cup of tea was heaped with sugar, a poison for a diabetic who was in fact prescribed a sugarless diet
On discovery of these incidents, I feared for her mental state but also feared for lost weight as clothes were getting looser and the trousers fell from her everslimming waist
Sleepless nights and scary moments whilst at work
My utmost concern was will I find her alive or passed out on my return
Could I decide to leave my career and livelihood
I feared I would not survive on the peanuts of an early pension
No more dithering!
Signed the letter of resignation and posted it ‘to whom it may concern’
Why fear?
God provides for He’s the sustainer, I truly believe.
by Sughra Begum
Final Days (iii)
Now silence is her torment as dementia takes hold
I’d like her to utter one word or a thousand and I’d listen patiently
If we could walk and hit the shopping bazaars or malls
Stop to get a tea and scone to soothe weary feet from hours of retail therapy
These days the purse remains untouched and bed sores are her only concern
Lifting a cuppa or simply taking a bite is not her plight
Just a smile and mouth open: Feed me, damned girl, feed me
We sit together and she drifts silently into slumber
Faintly she breathes, synchronising with the clock.
by Sughra Begum
Where is the Hope?
On dark days during the pandemic, it was hard as a carer to find a space to be. It was hard to feel a point to life, when the love shown was rejected or reacted to in anger, when life felt like a long dark tunnel of despair. How long would this continue? How long could I go on giving?
Then suddenly a tiny light breaks through, dispelling the gloom: an unexpected phone call offering sympathy, an email reminding me that others were thinking of me, a card in the post offering kind wishes, the discovery that someone was supporting me in prayer, even though I – being I –was unaware of it.
A bunch of flowers left in the porch, sharing a cup of coffee on a park bench in the cold –small tokens of love and support at a dark time, tiny sparks of encouragement, reminding me that no one is an island. We are all connected and can bring hope to one another.
by Linda Furbey
Nowhere to Go
(A Love Letter to my Campervan)
You sat outside my front door, Getting on in years but yet Reliable, trustworthy, awaiting Instructions for our next trip Somewhere, some place Where we could both Find solace.
You carried me, We explored together, It often felt we were one Eloping, searching for Some new place Where we could Find peace.
You were my guardian angel, We shared adventures, we shared a space To roam together
To breathe, to smile, to laugh, to grow, You kept me safe, and then, with love You returned me Home.
by Jude Gwynn
Owl
Sometimes at dusk
When the grass is high
We see the owl
Wings spread wide
White against the darkening sky
He soars, hovers, swoops
His aim is impeccable
He is magnificent
by Jan Outram
Her Boys
When she was days from death, My mother’s house had never been more alive.
If only they’d visited sooner, Taken her out, Bought her flowers, Told her they loved her – Her boys.
by Jan Outram
Summer Holiday
Everyone with a hint of Hippie was on the Isle of Wight in the summer of ’69. Weren’t they?
Well, I actually was. Not that we knew about the music festival, or why the island was flooded by 150,000 people with flowers in their hair!
It was our first family holiday away from caravan sites in Chapel St Leonards in ‘works weeks’.
I have no idea why my parents chose The Isle of Wight, but for me it was the most wonderful place I had ever seen.
I was 13. Not sure I even knew who Bob Dylan was, other than listening to a scratched LP that my big brother brought home. But I had a psychedelic dress, a pair of Jesus sandals and a cowbell – I had found my tribe!
Of course, I never even saw Dylan (although I did, many years later) but I did see, hear, feel things I had never experienced before. These were the beautiful people, they walked in bare feet, washed in the fountain, lay on the grass, there was music everywhere, I was in heaven!
How I would have loved to be a part of it! But I was just a teenage dreamer, full of angst, realising that there was life beyond my tiny world, and one day it would be mine!
by Anon
Cancer Ward
If this is a man then where’s the God that made him?
Created in his own image?
My God never looked like this. He shuffles past the door, dragging his shrunken feet like the man in the lace-less boots, collecting his daily gruel. His hair and his hope are gone, robbed by the drug that should have been his friend. He replays his life in the darkness, searching for meaning. If this is life then where is death? When will this war be over?
by Anon
The Wounded Self
Here’s to the men who kept quiet after the War, who went back to their loved ones, went back to work as if NOTHING HAPPENED.
No warriors’ tales from the Front. How could they picture a world without the people left behind? They were the generation maimed, men who kept quiet, returned to Civvy Street, went back to work, back to the wife and the kids, back to their homes as if NOTHING HAPPENED. They had to pretend. They were just a little quieter, perhaps a little more drunk and more violent. The bullet heart Is still there within the wounded self, just a little more hidden like lost love, only to come when unseen by others.
by Neil Simpson
A World Without Young Men
If you want to visualise the casualties of the Great War, take the tram trip from Meadowhall to Hillsborough. Count every young man –yes, every young man. Each time you reach the number, just say ‘BANG!’ and imagine they are gone forever. That’s what post-First World War Britain looked like –a world without young men.
by Neil Simpson
Timely Rest
In the dark in my bedroom, the old lampshade hung at an uncertain angle. Looks like a boxy bird in the light shadow, vague and sinister. The lights from the blinds are prison bars that imprison nobody. The hours drip byTime is having a rest, as if its distant relatives have left the old fella alone. Events will pour in –but not now.
by Neil Simpson
Mis/Connections
(For my mother, Tara Chatterjee)
Our ancestors play hide-and-Seek every other day I visit –tantalising and elusive, their voices just out of earshot.
‘Go, take their blessings,’ I am told.
‘It is their feet you should first touch, not mine. Start with the eldest. Look! Your maternal Great-grandma waves. Your youngest paternal uncle smokes a pipe behind that pillar. They will think you badly brought up! I taught you better. Go, now go! Apologise for missing them.’ I sigh, as always, embarrassed.
She says my sister too is here. But she had been my junior –how was it right to touch her feet? She never touched mine, when alive. Had dying made her my forebear? I humoured her to keep the peace. Be calm. I have paid my respects.
‘Your father too?’ I left none out. All have blessed me. All are content. Now at last she smiles. I hug her. My sweet mother, at ninety-one, still my ancestral rope-ladder, though the living are lost to her.
It’s you I came to see, I say.
It’s morning in the nursing home.
by Debjani Chatterjee
There were Times …
There were times when my sister was the enemy and I wondered why she had to be born. We’d fight and I always lost. There were other times when she was my very best friend and I wished we were twins. There were times when my parents didn’t understand me at all. More precisely, that was all the time! At times I was sure that, like Superman, I came from another world, and my parents were not mine.
I was convinced that I had invisible wings –there were times I almost felt them on my shoulders. All the time I longed to grow up. Childhood did not suit me. I could not masquerade like my sister.
She was a wise old granny who pretended she was a child – naughty at times, sweet at other times, but always hoodwinked the world into believing she was a cherub. But I was me. Growing up, I hoped, would solve my angst and make me the person I was meant to be. There were times when I believed I was a secret chrysalis waiting to moult into a butterfly, spread my wings and take off.
I look back now at my multicoloured childhood –how wonderful it was! It was always my kid sister who had my back. An old soul who had been this way before, she gifted me unconditional love.
by Debjani Chatterjee
Daibutsu
The Daibutsu towered over me – the most ginormous statue I had ever seen. I tightened my hold of my parents’ hands and craned my neck upwards to see the overwhelming image. Once it had all been covered in glittering gold leaf, but now the patina of green declared an eternity of withstanding tsunamis. From far below I could see a look of serenity; the eyes were closed and there was the ghost of a smile, a smile that played also on my parents’ reverential faces. The bronze hands were so still and restful on the lap in a meditation gesture. The great Buddha was hollow, and we followed within for a foetal reassurance. My parents chanted: ‘Buddham sharanam gacchami’, (‘I take refuge in the Buddha’).
That statue at Kamakura was to enter my collection of postage stamps and postcards; it has always stayed with me as an abiding memory. When battling cancer from my late 50s, I would repeat the mantra my parents had chanted. I would imagine myself climbing up the Daibutsu. I would reach my goal in the pink cherryblossomed open-air and take my rightful seat on Amida Buddha’s lap.
by Debjani Chatterjee
A Bird’s-Eye View of the Reading Room
A bird’s-eye view of where we’re at just at this precise moment? No bird of course would come in here unless brought in by some mischievous person. It couldn’t manage the doors, for one thing. But if it did enter, following some avid library user or perhaps an unwitting member of staff, it would perch on the long strip-light near the ceiling, or maybe grace the bookshelves that now sport pot plants of succulent green breaking up the monotony of books.
Monotony? What a misnomer! All life, all history, all adventure, all inspiration, is in these books. The bird would observe us sitting, heads bowed, our pens uniformly scribbling.
We are sitting in a squarish space that aspires to be a circle – colourful blobs of humanity on black faux leather sofas and armchairs. We are surrounded by books and wooden shelves, solid desks, chairs and tables, signs telling us about ‘Catalogue Encyclopaedias’ and ‘Quick Reference’, readers seated or floating about. A gift of a mandala for the mind and body to rest awhile and to glory in all of life’s brief splendours.
by Debjani Chatterjee
A Room of My Own
First published 2025 by Sheffield Carers Centre in celebration of 30 years of providing support for carers.
Sheffield Carers Centre, Dearing House, Young Street, Sheffield, S1 4UP. www.sheffieldcarers.org.uk
All rights reserved. No part of this booklet may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form, or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without prior written permission of the author and the publisher.
Our thanks to the Royal Literary Fund for supporting the monthly life writing workshops of Sheffield Carers Centre that are led by carer and RLF Associate Fellow Debjani Chatterjee.
Our thanks also to Sheffield Library Services for accommodating the workshops in the Central Library. The prose and poetry in this anthology is a small sample of the life writing generated by the project.
