​ALUMINA

Trying to escape just as he liked to do 
she goes down the garden into the shed 
the old door creaking arthritically as it opens 
Cobwebs inside tinselled with bits of dry leaf and grass 


Her sad soft eyes are drawn 
to the yellow faded newspaper on top of which is perched an aluminium saucepan ----- 
A relic from her childhood ……………. 


Her mind wanders back to the time 
when her mother boiled disagreeably bland potatoes 
on a hot summer day 
a window wide open to release the steam 
Gazing out, it was impossible not to notice a handsome straw haired boy 
strolling past 
Years later they bedded married and brought up two children ............ 


Suddenly it seems as if this saucepan an artefact from the past 
is the only tangible link left to her long lost girlhood ----- other memories evaporating in a fading mist ................. 


Now she must pull herself together make haste 
hurry to the hospital ------------
Looking past the tubes the sudden jaundice and decay ----------------------
She gently takes his hand as
The winter sun falls trembling from the sky


                      Night stars

              ……………….So brittle sharp and fragile