Bone China Poem by Ruth Walters

My mother would speak
in a soft whisper of bone china.
We'd tiptoe into houses where cups
and saucers had delightful patterns,
mind our manners, remove our shoes.

Later, there were mugs, odd shaped
and fancy but the plain ones
were the type she revered.
Mugs and mug ‘trees'
that sat on the side next to a biscuit tin.

Mother went some years ago
and daddy 10 years earlier.
He'd have a tin cup during in war years.
Tears and heart aches clatter now,
where lives were shattered.

I wash my own china in a
sink filled with bubbles,
thinking about their lives and struggles.
The last china cup cracked and broke
on the day they died.