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published in The
North, 38, ISSN 0269-9885;
in
collection Unsafe Monuments, 2006,
Arrowhead
Press, ISBN 978-1-904852-13-1
Ten Places Where I See My Mother
Mondays, in the kitchen,
her arms all suds.
I
peer through steam but she’s disappeared
till
I see her in the yard, pegging sheets.
Later
she’ll be upstairs, taking off her wet blue dress
or
coming out of the bathroom saying,
Don’t
use too much paper. We’re quite low.
In
the dark she’s in different places:
the
end of my bed, the space by the wardrobe,
picking
up my clothes.
Fuzzy
yellow light runs in ribbons
from
her head to her heels.
Her
footprints glow for ages after she’s gone.
Today
she’s in the greenhouse
wearing
gloves that are far too big
and
the old straw hat.
I
tap on the glass but she looks right through me.
I
wish she’d smile, come close,
stroke
back the fringe from my forehead.
Sundays,
I see her under the earth,
peacefully
asleep, her mouth slightly open,
but
she comes to when I start arranging flowers.
Going
home in the car, she sits beside me
folding
the cellophane to use again,
winding
the string round her little finger.
Jennifer Copley
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