she said you wouldn’t understand
she boiled my white school shirts
in a saucepan on the gas ring
she did i tell you
and the wooden poker got smaller and smaller
over the sweating
boy were those shirts white
and in the night she thump thumped
the iron over them sharing the heat of the coal fire
she did i tell you
other stuff she scrubbing-boarded
in the zinc bath after i got out
she did i tell you
there was a blue bag of whitener as i remember
and artic snow in a waxed pot for chilblains
how white these memories are in the draught
at the bottom of the curtained stairs before a toasting fire
with snow at the windows
she cried i tell you
often
she cried for everyone but never for herself
she was called upon the lay out the dead in the village
where the doors were always left unlocked
she would not have understood that cliché
but she understood the sanctimony of the church goers
in their fox stoles and lucky rabbits feet edged with silver
as her smile snuggled me watching them from her bedroom window
she laughed i tell you
not as often as she cried
laughing leads to crying she often said
now how sad is that i ask you
i could tell you lots of things but she said not to
they were our secret
and she took those to her grave
if i told you all she told me
you wouldn’t understand
but she did i tell you
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