Mama Tried lettering with revolver and flowers

The daisies came up along the back wall again this year, the ones your dad planted before he went off to the coast and never came back from. I pressed one between the pages of the Bible for you, though I expect you'll think that's soft. Mrs Pargeter says the pink ones are called cosmos, and I said I didn't care what they were called so long as they stayed put.

I've done the thing you told me not to do. Your dad's old revolver, the one with the silver scrollwork on the grip, went across the counter at Hoskins on Tuesday for ninety pounds. The rent was behind and the boiler gave up the same week. Don't go looking for it in the drawer. The drawer has a jar of buttons in it now and nothing else worth mentioning.

I got your letter with the prison stamp, the one saying you've signed up for the reading classes. Good. I read it three times at the sink. You always had a good hand when you bothered. I'm enclosing a stamp book and a photograph of the cat, who's gone fat and sulky since you left and sleeps on your bed like she owns it.

Come home when they let you. The daisies will still be here, and so will I, more or less.