Before This Day

Dad is painting window frames at the top of the house

Mum steadies the ladder with a slippered foot

My sister cannot bring herself to pour poison on the ants

Working their way frantically up the inside corners

Of this soon-to-be-a-home

I run through grass that has grown high above my head

I am a million miles away

I have no memories, I have no memories before this day

Cup of tea for the plumber, cup of coffee for the builder

Brother sister father mother

Each in love with one another

Somewhere, a whistling kettle

I meet the world and the world is a stinging nettle

Mortar bees living in the bricks

There may or may not be a snake in the compost heap

And the neighbour's cat is white and quite insane

Collarless, aggressive and unnamed

And I have never seen so many sheep

I have never seen so many cows

I was born to a family a little while ago

I was born to myself just now