Miss Minnes
'Miss M innes spends each winter with us here: October through to May.' In the lounge Miss Minnes sits and knots her hair • Through 'two borty,fingers, arid seems to cringe When anyone walks by her. 'Yes, she comes Of a very good family, up Inverness way.' Miss Minnes sits doing complicated sums, Dressed in a leather jerkin, day after day.
• 'She never speaks to anyone.' Long white face Where eyes lie sunk in dreams, or Maybe not.'
In the television parlour she takes her place For a minute or two, and then stalks out to sit In the lounge and knot her hair and stare, stare At the two electric bars which warm the room From October through to May. If people cared For Miss Minnes's seventy ' years, would she assume
They only meddled? 'Money's no object there.' Among the debris of the Field, the Sphere, And last week's Scotsman, she, with lank grey
hair, Sits silent, twitching, winter by wintry year.
ANTHONY THWAITE
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