PINNING MOTHER DOWN

"I always..." she put forth
" ...remember Mother

as a delicious smell
like an apple

pie cooling down
or a heated up dinner."

"Though now..." she corrected
her put-forth-remark

"|...as the nasty smell
of her elastic pale pink

roll-on corset.
Always gave me the shivers!"

Her words stood forth
upon the air

as if they had been
carved from there.

Pronouncements: never
just mere speech.

"Or that stink of mangy fox
stole she never wore

that always hid at the back
of her wardrobe

its beady little eyes
daring me to come nearer

so it could( and I knew it would )
bite me in two.

Or her knitting
that the cat always peed on

( she couldn't smell
a thing herself poor dear )

her scarves always smelling
of Tiddles.

Yes, Mother was as
perfect as Michaelmas daises

in a vase.

Although she always pronounced it
vas/e not va/se.

She was always such
a difficult woman

to pin down.

*


Visiting a friend in a ward....got taken over by the lady in the poem who thought I was her husband and started going on about her Mum. I didn't know the lady but for that short time she made her Mum immensely real to me. Her name was Betty as was her Mum.