The Photo
When I was quite small Gran kept sweets in a drawer,
Tucked in the cupboard, right next to the door,
And on the top shelf stood a photo of me,
Taken when I was perhaps two, maybe three.
She would re-tie my ribbon and smooth my blonde curls,
And say to me “Clare, you’re the luckiest of girls,”
I knew it was true, for I might have no Mum,
But I always had Gran; she was warmth, she was fun.
She’d put on her apron, light blue with pink flowers,
We’d stand in the kitchen and spend several hours,
Making tarts with thick treacle, warm, sticky and gold,
Which we’d eat, the same day, when the filling was cold.
When I couldn’t play out, and the weather was wet,
She would talk about Granddad and how they first met,
I had no recollection of him, none at all,
Just the grey peeling photograph, hung on the wall.
When I was fifteen, she would “tut” in despair,
At my tight fitting clothes and my pink tinted hair,
And when I went out on my very first date,
She sat in the window, eyes fixed on the gate.
She’d look over her glasses; become somewhat vexed,
As she warned of the perils of unmarried sex,
With wayward young boys who would lead you astray,
And once you’d succumbed, would just go on their way.
At nineteen, I came home, with my new boyfriend Paul,
And Gran, of course said, “I don’t like him at all,”
But as time went on by, he would coax her and tease,
Eventually Gran became far more at ease.
The day we got wed, she was surrogate ‘Dad’
She was all that I wanted, and all that I had,
As I swept down the aisle, with my rose pink bouquet,
At the grand age of sixty, she gave me away.
Now, twenty years later, I take her some flowers,
I sit by her bed, and I stay several hours,
I lean forward so gently, then softly I kiss her,
I tell her I love her, I tell her I miss her.
Her sweet smile is vacant, her eyes dim and sad,
She has no recollection of shared times we had,
I bring her clean clothing; I coax her to eat;
And try to ignore her sad air of defeat.
~
It sits on her dresser that photo of me,
Taken when I was perhaps two, maybe three,
With questioning eyes, she now cradles the frame,
And my tears gently fall as she asks me my name.
©Jan Jack’s Perfect Verse 2007
This was written in meemory of Jan's gradmother who raised her then contracted Alzheimers.
