Sunday falls
Sunday's levy is a fall and a tear:
The grit gripes and grinds with tiny teeth,
rings up its coin of scraped skin,
its mouthful of wool.
I slip a hooked finger in,
pull burry edges wide: no blood,
just the usual stings and stitches.
Under blue knit my knees are round
and hard as darning eggs.
At the instant of falling a stop
and a rush collide. Holes are my calling
and I ponder their collective names
while mum closes in: a host, a hoard,
a huddle, a spill, herd, hive,
charm, mob, throb. A cloud.
Best of all: a murmuration of holes, due
their quiet puffs, their quiet flutter in and out
the tunnel of my tights.
Mother slaps dirt off my legs,
all sighs and stringent hands.
On the way home dad photographs me
standing on a low wall. He calls: smile!
and I draw myself up
in my black patent leather shoes,
their toes well clawed,
my blue and red chequered poplin-coat
with its lustre of dust.
I give him a gap-toothed one
and that frayed blue ‘O’ stows away.
