Isabella Strachan
Wartime Mother
We fetched up in a northern town,
like driftwood among the ironware on the shore
we gathered when the cruel sea retreated,
to supplement the dusty, slate-mixed coal.
Such fires burned out before the time for bed.
The wartime summers were hot - we sunbathed in the dunes.
My youngest loved the sea’s edge and living sands.
The elder rode her bicycle before the wind
along the promenade.
‘Children in Europe would be glad of this’, I said,
as again they turned from the reconstituted meal
that tasted like pulped paper.
We forced down meat of doubtful provenance,
laughed at the cookery hints - ‘Add codliver oil to the mash’ -
the laughter grew hysterical. Boredom was more frequent.
Books with blurred print, few toys in the shops
the damp hours below ground when the siren howled;
the girls wanted the war to end
no less than the rest of us.
At night, drawing a curtain across the blind
to shut out a night too full of stars
(down the coast a solitary light
brought death and smoking ruins before the dawn),
in dreams I fed them buttered toast and new-laid eggs,
lamb from New Zealand, fruit from Africa,
filled them with sugar or chocolate;
goods brought on voyages through peaceful seas,
over sunken ships, unconsecrated tombs.
Page(s) 55
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