Mobility scooters under dark skies

I first came across mobility scooters inside Poole Hospital - I have to go there for blood tests and CT scans on a regular basis - I was sitting in Yellow Clinic, waiting to be called, when I looked up and saw a man riding a mobility scooter - I'd seen the red shape of the scooter just out of the corner of my eye - the rubber tyres of the scooter made no noise as they rolled over the floor -

In Yellow Clinic, there are neat stacks of magazines - I always try to read the same copy of Dorset Life whilst waiting for my appointment - other patients sit with their magazines, also going through the motions of pretending to read - all of us are afraid of hearing very bad news -

The faces of the specialist nurses never give anything away if you meet them before your appointment - you must wait for the correct moment to be told what stories your tissues recite -

Christopher Hitchens spoke of being carjacked to the country of the ill - for me, mobility scooters, swishing down a white corridor, remind me of that country's frontier -

I saw these mobility scooters on Eastbourne esplanade - six riders set off into the distance, two in front, four clustered together, further back - they don't look round - they move off under huge clouds - a string of light bulbs blows back and forth in a salty gale -

There's a shuttered beach shop in the foreground - an empty sea under the dark sky -