31st July 2026

 

spattered paint

it might look random

it's not

© Rachel Green July 2026

Sally Shaw

played the recorder for me

on a school outing to Bath

and I took a photograph 

with my old Box Brownie

with film you had to send 

for processing in Dis.

I always thought that was in Hell:

I read Dante at seven

Aristotle at eight

and Paradise lost shortly after.

I once cycled eleven miles

to go to Sally's birthday party

although I wasn't invited

but her mum gave me a drink of lemonade

and a slice of strawberry sponge.

She's dead now;

killed in a road accident

when she was thirty-seven

but in the photograph I took

she'd still playing the recorder

and smiling.

© Rachel Green July 2026