Gentler Than a Cricket Bat

The crunch under my foot on a sodden winter evening splinters at the soft place in my chest.

I try my best to dodge the snails,

But sometimes accidents can’t be avoided.

Our front porch is an eternal minefield to be navigated.

The silly creatures don’t seem to realise their camouflage is working against them.

Edward marched through them,

Boxes in his arms,

Unaware of the silver stream of shattered shells he’d left in his wake.

He never understood how fragile things were.

Tilly’s father used to hit them with a tennis racket.

Launching the poor molluscs out of his garden and into the woods behind his house.

‘Gentler than a cricket bat’, he’d say

And I’d nod in agreement,

My head a dead fish bobbing with the tide.

A ten-year-old's complicity all he needed to continue the ritual.

After Edward left, I retreated home with the dog.

Pavements look the same everywhere,

And I yearned for familiarity that wasn’t universal.

Tilly’s family had long moved on, a stranger now slept in her room.

I traced the parameters of my childhood in the woods that bordered her house.

The dog squatted at the base of a tree.

When I stood up with my hand full of warmth,

Amber shards glistening on the trunk caught my eye.

Glued in place by their demolished bodies,

The remains of shells plastered the bark.

Circular smudges emblazoned on every trunk that dared skirt the fence.

Shrapnel left over from years of garden banishment.

‘Gentler than a cricket bat’, her father used to say

And yes, I suppose it was.

But a tennis racket is only gentle for the hand that holds it.

The dog weaved between the copse.

A vertical tomb propped me up,

Forced to hold another shattered creature.

Bark flickered in the fading light,

A gleaming place where things came to die.

I thought of Edward

Our door always shuddered at the force of his hand.

As if it knew what would come.

His gaze never faltered as he approached his car,

Crushing everything as he walked away.

Raised in Thailand Alexandra now lives in London. Represented by United Agents her writing has been publish by Spread The Jelly, Jaden Magazine, Belladonna's Garden Magazine, Free The Verse and The Rally.