A Simple Game
(for Mary Baker)
Chopping fruit for an
Autumn dessert,
the rhythm of knife
on board lulls me.
I see my mother,
pinnied, in a 50s
Formica kitchen
peeling a Bramley.
It was a simple game:
each scrape of peeler
released an inch
of shiny spiral,
until a single helix
dangled unbroken,
flexing like a snake
on a blackthorn branch.
She gave me the knife:
if I could follow, tease
out my own green spring,
the blade would halve
a white apple heart
to be dipped in demerara;
always, like this memory
tasting bitter sweet.
Patrick Lodge was born in Wales, lives in Yorkshire and travels
on an Irish passport. His poetry has appeared in magazines and
anthologies in England, Wales, Ireland, Greece, Australia, New Zealand
and the USA. He was a prize winner in the 2009 Envoi
International competition.