Monday 27 September 2010

One Fine Day


by Mollie Panter-Downes.


I should probably be reading this in July,
 no matter, it may be set in one hot day,
but the narrator takes us back and forth through the seasons
and I am so enjoying it now.

Laura returning from another dispiriting shopping trip
to an unstaffed house,
reminisces about life before the war,

'coming in to the kitchen one autumn morning.
(Chandler had brought in a basket of pale-yellow pears, 
Victoria's cheeks were red as her little coat as she sat in her pram, 
the spider's webs had looped sparkling bridges 
across the smoky blue ravines of the Michaelmas daisies). 
There stood Mrs Abbey, making an apple charlotte, 
Laura remembered perfectly. 
Her hands flew, trimming bread crusts,
 lining the dish, adding fruit and cloves and brown sugar 
which immediately looked good, appetizing, 
when her fat pink hands touched them. 
Laura had stopped there watching,
for the operation had the fascination 
of the simple thing swiftly and perfectly done.'



Winter Sunshine by Phillis Waters 1940s


5 comments:

  1. Oh thank you for this beautiful post - the words paint such a lovely picture and the art you posted is so well matched.

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  2. Makes one want to rush and paint one's kitchen golden yellow !. But I think Husband will just settle for the Apple Charlotte .

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  3. A lovely snippet from the book, but I have to admit to a moment of shock when I thought that was a pig on the floor! (Well, people DID keep pigs in those days). Note to self: book opticians' appointment...........

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  4. I thought it was a pig, too - and I've only just had my tested!
    That's such a lovely book, I must read it again.

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  5. My eyes tested, I meant ... clearly, I should go back and have them done again!

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