I loved Granny Pearl.
She had a warm Aga
on dark wintry nights.
Friday evenings,
leaving demands behind,
we sped to the old farmhouse
hidden in narrow lanes
amongst the Cobb nuts.
‘My darlings’, she’d say
as we entered the kitchen.
It’s red stone flagged floor,
a step into times past,
where we became children once again.
Mandy would sit
on the silver Aga lid,
knees tucked under chin
and heels resting on the strength of the rail,
warming her bottom
and drying out
from the ravishes
of lashing wind and rain.
‘You must be hungry darlings!’
Granny Pearl would say,
as she peeled pizza
from the freezer chest,
or knocked out
a couple of solid fish fillets.
Either made me smile,
for they were wrapped
in packages of tenderness.
Chatting away in her melody
we drifted on warmed kindness;
a love reaching
through the week’s emptying
into mouths that were never full.
And with all the fondness of the fish,
still partially frozen
or the pizza
with or without a polystyrene bottom,
we were satiated
by her loving gentleness
and her welcome kiss.