Shirley Toulson

Shirley Toulson The cardboard shows me how it was When the two girl cousins went paddling, Each one holding one of my mother’s hands, And she the big girl — some twelve years or so. All three stood still to smile through their hair At the uncle with the camera. A sweet face, My mother’s, that was before I was born. And the sea, which appears to have changed less, Washed their terribly transient feet. Some twenty — thirty — years later She’d laugh at the snapshot. “See Betty And Dolly,” she’d say, “and look how they Dressed us for the beach.” The sea holiday Was her past, mine is her laughter. Both wry With the laboured ease of loss. Now she’s been dead nearly as many years As that girl lived. And of this circumstance There is nothing to say at all. Its silence silences. Infer the meanings of the following words from the context. paddling transient Now look up the dictionary to see if your inference is right.