She Was Just Called Love

Congratulations to Jacqueline Rowlands from Newquay! The Forward Press editors chose her beautiful poem as the deserving winner of the £500 prize.

In a pretty little hamlet
Down a winding leafy lane
In a cottage that was crumbling
Rotting wood and broken panes.

Lived a broken-hearted lady
Battling pain and toil and strife -
To her husband - now departed
She was once a loving wife –

Who was busy in her kitchen
Baking pies and cakes and bread
The smell of cooking filled the house
Her family were well fed.

The fire was burning brightly
There was laughter in the air
The highly polished furniture
Gave a sense of love and care.

She fussed around her family
Her love sincere and kind
However much she did for them
She would never ever mind.

Though worn out - she felt needed
She had a very treasured life
She gladly gave her heart and soul
To be a caring wife.

Then nothing! There was no one!
Alone, forlorn and scared
No one to love and care for
In the lovely home they shared.

In the fireplace a black hole
Where the embers once had glowed
No smell of cooking in the air
A house unloved. It showed.

She was rundown and so poorly
Yet she really didn't care
It was different when she felt love
Now it was feelings of despair.

She dragged herself around the house
Life was just a pointless chore
What didn't seem too urgent
She tended to ignore.

This desperate lonely lady
Who was painfully so sad
Truly thought on her own
She would surely end up mad.

Then suddenly - out of the blue
Her life was to change overnight
For what she then encountered
Was a sad and pitiful sight.

A kitten starving, hungry
Weak, just skin and bone
Frightened and crying
It was lost and all alone.

How could she ignore it?
How could she not care?
How could she not tend to it?
That would be cruel and unfair.

She stroked the poor baby
She lit her a fire
Put down a blanket
She purred with desire.

Now from the kitchen
The smell of rabbit and fish
And a little fresh cream
In her best Sunday dish.

Her eyes were now smiling
A gift from Heaven above
She never had a name
She just called her Love.

© Jacqueline Rowlands