"Pretty Bubbles in the Air"

Like a string of dancing bubbles,
words drift into my mind

kaleidoscope colours, carry on the wind.
I would cup my hands; capture them.

Only, I can’t. The cat, blithely jumps
onto the kitchen table

where I am trying to write, and
upstairs – the kids, fighting...again.

They thunder downstairs – daughter
buries her face in my lap, and

my son skulks and sobs, fit to burst,
saying she called him a ‘scaredy-cat’

and she, that he’d called her a ‘wuss’
first, and something else...far worse.

I tell them, ‘five minutes to tea’,
to stop it...or else, and to, please, wash up.

The moment is past – the bubbles burst,
and the soap stings my eyes.