Kitchen Conversation

My Poems (2)

Grandma yelled out 
'There's tails in the pan',
And then it caught fire.
So soon the draughty back playroom
Got a new stove and
Became the hub of the house.

But what of the old kitchen,
Beneath the loft where I lay
Frozen with the large windows all around,
Bodget and squash
Transformed it into a bog
And a store,
For mother's material 
For her market stall.

He hung his pain there,
The stinking riddled bang birds,
Put there to deter
Anyone from entering more than once.

But mother was there
In her store,
Was she listening 
To the Dales Poacher above,
Creeping up
And sliding his hand under the fabric?
Dark deeds, dark days,
A stolen Testament of my youth.

He strung up his prey
In the old kitchen's new bog,
To keep the French girls away
From the store with the stink.

A new loo in the new kitchen's cupboard instead,
While he continued to poach
My pancake flat baps,
The poor cold bang birds beneath my bed,
Hanging there riddled with flies.

Oh yes, father had it in mind to deter 
Visitors to the old bog 
In the older kitchen 
Hub of the house.

But wasn't mother next door in her store
Sorting her fabric and writing her social studies?
Her hearing was tuned
To the creaks above,
Or was she off to her jubilee committee nightly?

As if a dead pheasant myself,
Stinking out the bus
I lay lifeless limp and petrified each night.



By Patricia Goldberg © 2021