Phew uncle Basil! Was he in Fawlty Towers??
Cheers thanks p
-----Original Message-----
From: Poetryetc: poetry and poetics [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On
Behalf Of Max Richards
Sent: 23 January 2013 06:43
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Uncle Basil's silences (memory snaps)
Uncle Basil's silences
boxed me in, did the same
for Verna his tall wife,
Marie his fair daughter
(same age as me), or so I felt
standing by him (at thirteen, already
his height) in his tiny glass-house
down past the back-yard
revolving clothes-line -
having smilingly noddingly
scoffed in her trim kitchen
some of Verna's scones
with cream I'd helped whip
and her own strawberry jam
and an uninterruptible
stream of her thoughts
excited and confusing -
ducked out back and slipped
past the narrow glass door
to where he stood frowning
tending his begonias.
Silence implied I ought
to know more about
propagating begonias
than ask such ignorant questions.
Silence implied I should
show more respect and not
inadvertently seem
to hint that flowers
were sweet but unmanly,
homebodies like him tame,
shift workers at the
telephone exchange,
one of whom he was,
less worthy than my
school principal Dad
who was seldom at home.
The begonias glowed
modestly in his care,
his private harem,
no one but him would share
unless they tapped like me
on the steamy glass door
and he generously let them in.
Marie didn't care
to see him down there,
indoors was enough for her,
piano practice supervised,
maths solutions worked through.
His silence implied 'women
are the unstoppable talkers,
I'm of other timber
to bear life's hard knocks
and carry on working.'
Verna and Marie knew
to humour him,
the breadwinner,
pack him off to work
with his prepared boxed meal,
talk in whispers when the shift-worker
slept in curtained dark.
Basil at the wheel of his small
old Morris, saved petrol by
switching off, coasting
downhill. Basil when they left
after a social evening call
switched on, inched forward
while Verna on our front porch
bestowed on us the last
rapid thoughts of the night,
scampering to the street,
no, back to the porch
for one more urgent speech,
at long last to clamber aboard
Basil's moving car, himself
staring ahead with sealed mouth
behind the homeward-turned wheel.
|