Friday tea
Auntie-Alice-next-door swore
that her-across-the-road served up
four slices of bread and marge
and one pot of Shipham’s paste
between four of them.
My non-conformist mother
said nothing about the plates full
of steak and chips or lamb stew
or pork chops that she herself loaded
onto our droppers-in.
But the way she thinned her lips
made me wonder if the reason
she mouthed ‘Catholic’ when
talking about her-across
wasn’t so much about faith
but more about the sparseness
of meat-and-two-veg.
“meat and two veg” might mean more than one thing to some people?!?
Touche!
Great poem. I love the hyphenated lines in the first stanza. I can hear the whispery, gossipy voices of these characters. And I like ‘the way she thinned her lips.’ Interesting split of the last stanza, having the last two lines stand alone, I’ve read it over and over and somehow the gap gives it more….impact.