Breaking in new shoes

I'd used to think
Aunty Vi next door was like a fairy
all slim in summer clothes,
with her blonde permed hair
and painted eyes wide in suprise
that she had no wings.

When I was little,
I used to go round
and she'd give me biscuits.
Mum said I wasn't to cause trouble
but Aunty Vi said
she hardly knew I was there.
Mum said Aunty Vi was too polite
to complain.
I didn't go round so much
once I'd learned to read.
Fairy stories
were more real.

But we'd look after Aunty Vi's cats
and Uncle Johnnie's fish
when they went on holiday
and she would ours'
when we went away.

When I left art school
Aunty Vi asked to see my photographs.
Of the two she liked best
she bought the one of cobwebs
and dead leaves
though I thought it was gloomy
for her clean bright kitchen walls.
"I think there are fairies there"
she daid, then looked embarrassed

The last few years
Vi was a bit forgetful.
she'd come without a sound
so you wouldn't know she was there
then when you turned round
she'd be smiling at you
"It's only me!" she'd whisper
and giggle like a little girl.

Last year she locked Johnnie out;
she'd been watching the news all day
and was too afraid
to let a stranger in.

She didn't recognise the lady
who came to do her hair
or the lady
who came to clean, either.

And when Johnnie
went on holiday
"she panicked" said the jolly nurse
he'd left behind to care for her.

But she kows Mum and me
Now
I say "You look well"
and Auntie Vi's fairy smile
breaks though the fear
in her unpainted eyes
Then I make a mistake
"I DO like your shoes! Are they new?"
and her ease as quickly goes
because she doesn't know
if they're new
and this reminds her
she doesn't know why
we're here
and this reminds her
she doesn't know
where here is

I wanted to give her biscuits
but she knows she's on a diet -
the one constant,
so I give her the other picture,
of rainbowy raindrops
which she had liked years ago,
to put on the nursing room wall.

I hope she likes it still,
it's hard to tell, she's so polite
and kind, still.