poem
VIVIEN JONES is a semi-professional early musician who lives on the north Solway shore in Scotland. Her first collection, About Time, Too, is published by Indigo Dreams.
Vivien Jones: FIRST PRIZE My Mother’s Literature
was Woman’s Realm each
Tuesday, collected with shopping,
a dinner recipe adapted
to cheaper ingredients,
Bisto for gravy, mutton for lamb,
mousetrap cheddar for Wensleydale.
The letters and the problem pages,
the medical Q & A, read in order,
in the twenty minutes before school’s end.
Fireside evenings for the serial,
she never knew whodunit blindfolded
by innocence, she groped for the plot.
Each Wednesday, last week’s mag
carefully cut, knitting patterns
stored in a fat brown envelope,
household tips in a tea caddy,
special offers in her purse,
like any librarian, an orderer.
Finally, the astrology and puzzles
pages down for the cat, she didn’t
believe in fate or cleverness.
