JANE McLAUGHLIN

Reds house Interior decoration exclusively by time ; the air in your house has matured to the colour of fine pale tea. eighty-five years in the same house have fashioned a harmony of tone, an expensive fading no artist could have accomplished for money. distraught sepia ladies, muted chintz; but the brilliance of silver and rainbow on black, the Chinese rug you took out of hiding only a month ago.

Once the house was full of men, big men, loud voiced, farmers, tramping in and out shouldering the narrow doorways, spreading their noise like mud. yours dead in a war sixty years ago ; never married. the land sold, even the cat and dog dead; you and your house keep tune with each other. still your garden jostles with flowers, swarms with fruit : stones of tomatoes in sagging bunches the greenhouse roofed with grapes : you can’t stop growing things; almost running to meet us, demanding where was the baby; stripping the sweet peas in haste : ‘It would be a kindness to take them otherwise I shan’t get any for myself.’ such gracious garden logic, such grace in your hooked back and young black hair. There are men now, but far away, deans and professors across the Atlantic, spare, economical, but taking some energy from that family who filled the house. that house which always looks as if someone has been up very early in the morning. you and your house together : we shut the gate on a unity. Some wear life-force like a tongue of fire you carry yours unaware. eddies, the curl-back of the stream occurring in neglected places.