<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Mum\u2019s Visit<\/strong><\/p>\n The quilt\u2019s growing across the floor Then it\u2019s your dad who ran away Wensleydale takes over conversation: From a viewing gallery, we watch My mother, you say, would keep <\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n Stuart Pickford<\/strong> is the recipient of an Eric Gregory award. His first collection, The Basics,<\/em> was published by Redbeck Press (2002) and shortlisted for the Forward Best First Collection prize. His second collection is Swimming with Jellyfish<\/em> (2016) from smith\/doorstop. Stuart lives in Harrogate and teaches in a local comprehensive school.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Mum\u2019s Visit The quilt\u2019s growing across the floor you say as we drive up the A1. The scenery\u2019s your evenings at home: checking the phone for messages, drawing curtains. The silence. Then it\u2019s your dad who ran away to Mansfield with Aunty Mab, whose best friend was his wallet, who said you\u2019d […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-12527","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-prose-poetry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12527","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12527"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12527\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":13471,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12527\/revisions\/13471"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12527"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12527"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12527"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\nyou say as we drive up the A1.
\nThe scenery\u2019s your evenings at home:
\nchecking the phone for messages,
\ndrawing curtains. The silence.<\/p>\n
\nto Mansfield with Aunty Mab,
\nwhose best friend was his wallet,
\nwho said you\u2019d be ladding<\/em>
\nif you joined the athletics club.<\/p>\n
\ndifferent coping and through-stones,
\ndifferent stitches around fields.
\nLater, in the diary, rennet
\ndraws the solids out of milk.<\/p>\n
\nthe workers with carving knives
\nslice up a tank of curd
\ninto blubbery slabs that are hauled
\nover to drain the whey.<\/p>\n
\nany milk that had gone sour,
\nplace it in a muslin bag and hang it
\nfrom the cold tap; she made
\nthe best cottage cheese ever.<\/p>\n