Jude Brigley

At my mother’s house

At the corner of my mind, my bike
is still propped
in the stairwell
but the nail
where I hung my coat
is just a hole in the sanded wood.

And the kitchen, where she never cooks now,
is heavy with sizzling and splashing,
here, where the dead jostle for my attention.
Though I glance up at the
blue volumes of Dickens
I am not surprised to see
cups and saucers on the top shelving.
And yet I duck
under invisible
clothes drying,
before a fire that has long
burnt out.

Jude Brigley is Welsh. She has been a teacher, an editor, a coach and a performance poet. She is now writing more for the page.