An Absence of Life

We sleep in jam jars 

on the top shelf in the scullery.

There are a lot of us,

and besides, it’s the warmest room.

I squint through glass

at Grandpa’s rainbow head,

but not at Granny’s prunes, 

that sit like slugs laughing

on the yellow saucer on the sill. 

They keep me regular, she says, 

like clockwork. But I know that —

she owns one big, one