every family has 'the' aunt - the one that is strange the one grown ups are reluctant to mention in the company of innocent children
when they grow up the cousins sometimes chat...
do you remember aunt virginia?
she never married...
(wasn't she the one who had the abortion?)
(wasn't she the one who liked girls?)
(wasn't she the one who liked the gardener?)
(and didn't she drink?)
no nothing that bad-
she was the one who looked after her mother for twenty years;
she looked after her mother until she took a pillow to her
suffering mother's face
one of the pretty pillows she had worked out in cross stitch
for hours and hours
for years and years
sitting next to mother's bed
she stitched and stitched
(eventually only her fingers bled)
which pillow was it, dear?
the one with white jesus on the cross?
the one with blood roses and their thorns?
the one with the baby faces in blue embroidery?
(wasn't she the one who had the broken heart?)
every family has that aunt the skeleton in their closet
in my family
i guess,
she is already me
seasofme090613holly
but aren't i amazing...! (i had better add that by 'i' i mean the images of me, skeleton aunt...)
YOU ARE READING
body
Poetrymy personal favourites in one book. these all come from older collections. hardly any of the media belong to me