When You Thought I was Dying
If a candle’s lit inside this bowl
the patterns on its belly grow —
those painted leaves,
that silver lily
that looks from here
like a cabbage rose.
(Cabbage roses bloomed on
the papered walls of our first flat.
Yellowing.)
I took lilies to your great-aunt once.
As I glanced back at her window
she was bending over,
feeding them to the fire.
You gave me this bowl
when you thought I was dying.
I can’t give it back.
I can’t burn it.
I can’t even tell you how
it scares me
half to death.
Gill McEvoy is a Hawthornden Fellow. Her second Cinnamon Press collection is Rise ( 2013.) Gill runs many poetry events in Chester where she lives.