Sisters

These two, DOROTHY AND CLARICE DENCH —
A pair of local spinster sisters, as I guess —
Both died, two years apart, aged ninety-five.
Yet ‘We are only here a little while’
Is carved, with names and dates, into this bench:
A saying of theirs, perhaps, that raised a smile
When each new birthday found them still alive,
That friends recalled with wry tenderness?

Did they walk their dogs here every day
Then stop at ‘their’ bench and sit gratefully,
Half-hearing distant cries (Howzat? or Play!),
Half-watching men in whites move on the green
As ‘Flush’ and ‘Bingo’ barked at long leg-drives
That rolled, to dry applause, towards the screen?
Unhusbanded, the days turned into lives
That went on for almost a century —

Wars and revolutions came and went;
Shop windows in the high street showed strange goods
While brands grew less and less familiar;
Children from the new-built neighbourhoods
Wore different clothes, played different games.
And soon they had forgotten what men meant
Who came proposing that they change their names,
And live apart, with them; what could be sillier?

In winter there were evenings by the fire
With books and Scrabble and the wireless, tuned
To the ‘Light’ or the more uplifting Third;
A nip of gin or sherry. When the hours
Of daylight lengthened, stooped among the flowers
They weeded, planted, pottered; tea-times, spooned
Out jam they’d made from last year’s fruit, and heard
Their neighbour practise hymns for Sunday’s choir.

— So, in a few short minutes of my walk
I’ve furnished them with decades here, routines
Adopted to protect them from all harm,
From fears they never felt, once past their teens.
Ninety-five! Did they show bravery and charm
Towards a world that they had ceased to know?
If not, what happened when they had to talk?
What is there to fall back on, when those go?