What Happened to Dorothy
That’s me on the left.
Page-boy in a velvet suit.
Four years old, blond curls and scowling.
Lucky horseshoe trailing.
That’s Dorothy, Maid-of-Honour.
Though only three years older,
in her long white dress,
veil and floral tiara
she could be a teenager.
She never would be, though.
(It wasn’t a road accident)
Tin bath in the kitchen.
(It wasn’t diphtheria)
Pan after pan of boiling water.
(Or polio, or cancer)
Kids warned not to run about.
(It wasn’t murder on the sand dunes)
Only half full, but scalding
(It wasn’t drowning in the canal)
When she tripped and fell in.
That’s me on the left.
Lucky horseshoe still trailing.
That’s Dorothy, still seven.