Blue Blood

This cento is based on poems contained in Lily Brett's 5th Collection of Poetry
In Her Strapless Dresses and Mud In My Tears
RWP Mini Challenge #4

Blue Blood

Their English
wasn't up to scratch

my mother and father
struggled and juggled
through a lexicon jungle

listen to her beautiful English
my mother and father
said to one another

I cried over Der Erlkonig
I was a bright child

I practised my German
I practised so hard
I won the school German prize

God was not at home in our house
my parents had seen through him

I was hardly Jewish
had barely been inside a synagogue

I married an Aryan
to father my children

I used to speak German
it was my muttersprache
I wanted to slash it out of my mouth

I can't get rid of the Nazis
I can't leave them
and they can't leave me

For years I hid everything I ate
except my fat
which I wore like and over sized
ill fitting Yves Saint Laurent ski suit

my mother was strong
she could open
the most stubborn
jar of pickles or herring

since you died
I have wanted to join you
when I get tired

if you look carefully
past my dark lipstick

while others sip cocktails
and exchange pleasantries
I can summon impending doom