Each year
they seem to die,
winter
beneath scarred wood
transforming in the dark.

Pale buds
return, fingertip
the air,
unclench fistfuls
of layered cream

I balance
against my hands,
relinquish
to day, night,
sunlight and rainfall

showering petals
across the lawn,
hemming
my garden path
with summer silks

Treasure your holidays
in Llandudno, Alice.
Skip along the promenade,                          
play tag on the beach
and when it’s time for bed                                
wave goodnight to the sea
as it drinks the sunset.

Go boating on the Thames.                            
Paddle your fingers.                                      
Listen to stories, doze.

Chase a talking  white rabbit
sporting white
 kid gloves.    


Take tea with a dormouse,
  play croquet with a Queen:
  
  this is not your dream
  but makes you smile.

  Don’t wish too hard
  for womanhood,
  it arrives soon enough.

  You’ll be feted, photographed,
   posed as holy Agnes
   and noble Alethea.  
                
  With "dreaming eyes of wonder" 
  Discover Alice
  in your own looking-glass.

   And when it’s time to dance
    in your bridal gown
    cherish the moment.

    Two sons will die
    fighting for their country.

    Remember them
    as flames that burn
    long after each candle’s
    blown.

You lean over the table and touch my hair,
ease it from my face, flick it down my neck.
Beautiful,you say, though the colour's mixed
by Carys at the salon, daubed onto my roots.

We eat while I window gaze, the ice-pink sky
slushing to grey, the day in transit between light
and dark as night tows it across the afternoon,
discards shadows of where I walked and stood.

Shoppers to and fro along the pavement, edge
further from the sun with each footfall and turn
of a baby buggy wheel and I'm lost,slip-sliding,
paring time into remainders. I  tell you how I feel

knowing it's Autumn, our favourite season; October,
the month we were married all those years ago.
You look surprised,disappointed,but when I ask
you smile, shake your head, speak of other things.

Garden cuttings grew slowly
in my Aunt's back lawn.

She coaxed them with words
and wet tea-leaves,
watched them flourish one year
in sunlit rows.

Mum had no time for flowers,
looked warily
at this late harvest
from the Mother she adored.

Dried lavender
sifted into hand-sewn bags
we tucked beneath petticoats,
knickers, linen handkerchiefs.

Roses and pinks
filling clear glass vases,
scenting the house as though
Gran was close by,

had just stepped outside
to unpeg her washing.

He's hunkered down
for the night,
I know this toasted
do-not-disturb-me
duvet-bundled shape.

I won't disturb him
though he snores,
grunts, filches
more duvet from
my half of the bed.

His hair's
too boyishly tousled
on the pillow,
his familiar spine
so purpose-built

for lying
beside, nuzzling
against, sneaking
my arm around
in the dark.