My grandmother, in the kitchen,
is talking to herself.
‘I had a friend called Alice,’
she intones, low voiced.
‘My friend called Alice baked bread;
she baked bread, ever day,
She was ill, and never told anyone
(I never told anyone
this, but she never did.)
Then she died, and nobody worried
no one had worried, she never
told anyone – so,
nobody ever did.’
My grandmother, in the kitchen,
keeps talking, telling herself. She says
she had a friend called Alice – she
says this baking bread, her daily bread –
and I know she never did.