ALICE ALONE.

A GIRL IN MENTAL ASYLUM.

After her third mental breakdown, they locked
Alice away in some ward in an out
Of town asylum for the mentally

Insane, as they termed it back then. We will
Visit, Father said, and bring goodies and
Bunches of flowers and see how well you

Improve (if you do, he said behind his
Hairy hand) and maybe, if they say you’re
All right, we’ll take you home again, and you

Can have your old room back and we’ll move the
Lodger elsewhere in the house, maybe the
Attic, despite the cold and damp. But he

Never brought any goodies or bunches
Of flowers, he never showed. Mother came
Once or twice looking at her daughter with

Nervous eyes and fumbling hands, gazing
At her wristwatch, wanting the time to go,
Muttering dull pleasantries and watching

Alice’s every move or gesture
Of hand or uttered speech. Have to go now,
Alice, Mother said when the bell sounded,

Be back again next week. But she never
Came again, only Molly the girl next
Door came, and sat and talked in her slow drawl,

Offering Alice the occasional
Cookie her mother made. Alice sat and
Listened and sniffed and stared and smelt the stool

Of death in the girl’s words and breath. Alice
Sits alone now; the visitors have all
Fled or gone away or grown old or dead,

And outside the window snow drifts and falls
On fields and trees as her other self calls
Through passages, doors, rooms and lonely halls.