Fish and Chips

When I went round the next day
with a bottle of wine, his wife said
he was bruised down both sides
from squeezing through
our upstairs bathroom window.
He’d been on his way to get more fish
from the freezer at the end of their garden
when he saw us next door:
you, not good with heights, stopped
around four rungs up,
and me, heavily pregnant, holding the base
and weakly cheering you on.
He jumped over the fence
and did what needs must,
no locksmith needed, and Josie,
still asleep in her cot, none the wiser,
though his customers must have wondered
what was taking so long –
Friday night and the queue spilling
along the street as he ascended –
until he appeared with a smile
and a How can I help?,
went back to the everyday work
of stirring flour and milk into gold.

Tess Jolly has published two collections, Intimate Architecture and Breakfast at the Origami Café, both with Blue Diode Press. She lives with her family on the south coast of the UK, where she runs her freelance editing business: www.poemsandproofs.co.uk.