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On yon Zoom
the ither day a wee bit friendly argie-bargie stertit up
aboot whit exactly wis
an ashet
when it wis at hame? Well, some wid huv it
it wis a muckle-great delft platter for servin,
say, a hail gigot o mutton roastit wi aw the trimmins
an ithers insistit, naw it wis nuthin but a
humble enamel pie-dish
sich as ye’d mibbe mak a shepherd’s pie in, or yaise
for reheatin (o aye, in a gey hoat oven!)
yesterday’s left-ower stovies or day-afore-peyday pan-haggis
(never ever cryin that skirlie, nut ata,
no here in Glesca, no in the West.)
There’s folk wouldnae gie houseroom
to this shabby aul chrome-platit slottit-spoon
wi hardly a scrap o rid or black pent left on its widden haunle, but –
it was ma mither’s – I haud it in ma haun wi ma
heid fu o mince an reminiscence, thinkin
how a clock could be a clock or a black beetle
how a sair heid is a sair heid but a sair haun is a piece
an jam — oh as long’s the slice o breid’s as thich as a doorstep
an the jam strawberry or rasp (the blood, the bandage) —
an I’m wonderin
— since the press in ma kitchen contains baith
a chippt bog-standard wee white pie-dish, an
thon oval antique art-nouveau losol-ware tulip servan-dish
I got for a shillin in a kirk jumble-sale in the sixties —
pie-dish or platter? Which is the classic ashet?
Och, settle an argument with a friend, wee bit o
elementary detective work in a dictionar an here, it
turns oot it’s no either/or but baith/and
— which is even better (for mair is ayeweys mair than less
in ma book, eh no?)
An I’ll tell ye wan thing for shair:
ma brand-new winterdykes
I ordered online an that arrived the day fae Amazon
might no be made o wid but raither
o clean plastic an lightweight metal
an huv an awfy well-designed an nifty wey
o foldin doon tae nuthin to store gey neatly in the loaby press
or o openin oot lik wings
and takin a loat mair claes than ma pulley ever could?
But they’ll aye be ma
winterdykes.