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.