Drinking Coffee

I stir my coffee. The spoon squeaks

against the smooth glaze,

plain chocolate colour,

banded with orange sun circles



I let it rest, squat sturdy cylinder,

on my palm, feel the warm comfort

of clay on clay, like hope restored



There was a wall-cupboard

in my mother's kitchen;

father built and fixed it

when they first moved in, new-married,

in the mid-nineteen-twenties;

she waited nearly thirty years

before he fitted the glass doors.



It was here the mug had its place;

I would bring it out to drink from,

while we sat and talked

by the bumbling gas fire

after his death, in the years

that seemed to go on for ever.



A year ago

I reached it down for the last time.

Now, in a different house,

I lift it on my palm

to gaze at its proud gleam

in bright January sunlight,

and remember.



We are fellow travellers.










Copyright © Bernard Gilhooly - All Rights Reserved