April's Grief
April shuffles round her roomSearching for something , she’s not sure what.her head a muddle of strange thoughtsand dreams just out of reach.People visit and she knows she should know who they are.They check up on her, and steal her treasures.She hides her most precious things under her pillow,and cries when someone finds themand puts them in the bin.Her mother visits sometimes,but lies to her, and says “I’m not your Mum, I’m your daughter”,and gets angry when April asks again when dinner will be ready.April gets up early for work, and dresses herself in an old brown cardi over her nightgownslippers on the wrong feet, and one pink bedsock bundled in the toe.April feels the discomfort but isn’t sure why her foot hurts.The woman in the blue uniform makes her a cup of tea, then leads her back to bedsaying “It’s too early for work, I’ll wake you in time”April finds a telegram one day. It’s in a biscuit tin full of papers.She opens it, and reads the words. “regret to inform you your son is missing, believed killed in action”April screams, cries, goes in to the corridor and collapses in a heap of fresh new grief for the boy she has just lost, again.