Nettles When I am old I will totter along broken pavements the strings of my boots undone smelling a bit strong like any fat old woman who has forgotten which day is Tuesday (my bath night if you like) stiff my clothes from old dirt not sweat at my age mumbling the cracked enamel mug eleven cats playing in my weedy yard drinking my little ration of milk with me and withy withy the cats circle around my house at night singly filing in and sleeping on the saggy stained bed and the chair and the crumby tabletop One day they will find me dead O dead dead A stinking old bundle of dead and in my hand a peeled wand and in my ear a cricket sitting telling me stories and predictions and the time of night Childermas 1 a word meaning Holy Children has been lost between the pages of a book one early dusk you lean over my shoulder the better to see what I am reading you riffle through the pages with your thumbs and that forgotten sound escapes into the world through the fan of leaves at once we begin trying to pronounce it the long and difficult vowels rest on our lips like stinging insects we dare not brush away then the computer gets hold of it flaps the syllables about cards follow cards sliding out and piling up and on the cards the punched names of daughters and of sons their many variations from century to century from language to language 2 the Madonna whose smile is as sweet as plaster turns out to be made of painted wood her stiff crinoline is carved as well as painted perhaps to hide the hinges that pin her skirts together a bent sexton with floppy hair fits in the tiny key so delicately made a brass scroll the saints, children of Mary, live beneath her skirts there they stand in stiff rows palms raised together in a prayer one row for martyrs one for prelates another for pinched abbesses who have given it all up at the very centre where Mary’s legs (if she had any) would spring from her body winged innocents play among vines and ears of carved wheat the true heart of the Madonna remarks the sexton with sacred joy 3 one Sunday in May our children who have hardly noticed us till now decide on a Feast of Recognition the youngest brings chains of withering marigolds twines them over the backs of our chairs the two eldest, with napkins over their arms, bring in the dinner course by course the food, thank goodness, is invisible we gesture over huge empty plates our daughter, not spilling a drop, pours red ink into the glasses for wine the last course is a much more solemn affair we are told to rise and all together sing the muddled singing gives a mewling sound then a dish of flames is set down before me its cinders glowing like cherries you are luckier get a basket of petals into which you dip your face making munching noises you come up smiling crushed petals cling to your hair who is to blame for my lips’ blisters? afterwards your cool mouth tastes of almonds