Homemaking

My uncle took his bride

from the portals of an Indian summer

of print dresses and cream ice-cream.

Her aunts got together a patchwork quilt;

her mother’s delph – unbroken for two generations –

went on a clevy her handyman father made.

My uncle made handiwork of her

homemaking, drank to a busy grave.

Now in this Indian summer

she trusts the weather,

washes the quilt,

sits on the terrace, a newspaper,

glasses unsteady on her apron-lap

watching it dry.