Christmas Eve tea
5 o’clock.
Light silvers the sill.
This is the season of curious moons,
when we’re lost in the velvet of ourselves,
undreaming the deep nights
between tomorrow and the past.
Rooms flower slowly, like stars.
Here are steep steps,
a hexagon of doors,
two china dogs guarding
the gas fire’s slapped cheeks.
I find the Smarties tube of tuppences.
I shake the Virgin so the Holy Water swirls.
I am allowed to sink my face
into the Sunday furs.
In the kitchen,
a clutch of pinnied women
makes the china clink.
Cold meats,
trifle,
salad from a tin.
This is not a photograph –
it’s the warm edge of the past
where the women I love
are still alive.
I thought life would slot
into a snug line
by the sink.
My kitchen is neat and cold.
Light silvers the sill.
At the window, stars.
Catherine Ayres is a teacher from Northumberland. Her debut collection, Amazon, was published in 2016 by Indigo Dreams.