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Broken biscuits
Auntie Val dunked a chocolate digestive in her tea
And began telling me of how, at the end of each week,
She and the girls would leave the rhythm and the sound
Of the factory floor at the call of the Bournville sirens,
To go get first dibs from the Cadbury discounted store.
A privilege for the workers to get seconds and imperfections
In a myriad of confections, in the 1980’s
When the company wasted not what they wanted not,
The lucky dip of broken biscuits
Huddled in their cellophane clear bags tied at the top,
Clipped.
A medley of Cadbury bourbons,
A jungle of jumbled Cadbury animals,
And chocolate fingers,
Fractured.
Manufactured treats of the bittersweet factory rejects.
Auntie Val told me of her friend, Linda -
How she'd waved goodbye to her,
A “ta-ra-a-bit” to her as she got on the bus,
In a floral print shift dress,
Worn.
Linda clutching her bag of biscuits with crumbled edges,
Homeward bound.
With her hopeful tokens to heal trusts that were broken,
Words that should have remained unspoken,
If only Linda could have had sight beyond the veil of her wedding,
That when alone together,
Her milk tray handsome man,
Who promised her roses,
Set her far heart aflame,
Was cold and deceitful, no hero,
No shame.
Auntie Val said, “But then that was our Linda,
Who in her foolish wisdom, thought of him as her only option -
A Dairy Milk girl wrapped in romantic fiction,
Forever, a glass and a half full.”
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