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You just can't imagine how many months I've been trying to do it to where it was not a mile long. : ) Anyway, it probably is longer than yours, but I'm sure you will shorten it for me. . . and I want you to. Pat
Peace of Mind
There’s no accounting for it
or the way it turns up in a chemo room
in the form of a bright, lively nurse
who sticks your port
and keeps returning to check on you
even though every chair is filled.
How can you not let go of fear?
You sip the coffee handed you
as you take in the moment
that honors the lost breast.
You try to memorize the smile
of the one with the French accent seated
beside you. Her being here proves
that you were not abandoned,
that peace of mind saved its brightness
for you alone.
Peace of mind is the bank account
left by the former husband you never really understood,
the one set on coming to his granddaughter’s birth
though his heart was congesting
and breaking.
It finally comes to the farmer’s wife
bereft of child, to a little girl
whose drunk father sits in a dark corner.
It comes to the puppy lying outstretched
in front of a heater,
to a widower examining cirrus clouds.
It even comes to rocky cliffs barren of trees,
to fog gathering and lifting its skirts,
to the bent flowers weary of standing straight.
Peace of Mind
There’s no accounting for it
or the way it turns up in a chemo room
in the form of a bright, lively nurse
who sticks your port
and keeps returning to check on you
even though every chair is filled.
How can you not let go of fear?
You sip the coffee handed you
as you take in the moment
that honors the lost breast.
You try to memorize the smile
of the one with the French accent seated
beside you. Her being here proves
that you were not abandoned,
that peace of mind saved its brightness
for you alone.
Peace of mind is the bank account
left by the former husband you never really understood,
the one set on coming to his granddaughter’s birth
though his heart was congesting
and breaking.
It finally comes to the farmer’s wife
bereft of child, to a little girl
whose drunk father sits in a dark corner.
It comes to the puppy lying outstretched
in front of a heater,
to a widower examining cirrus clouds.
It even comes to rocky cliffs barren of trees,
to fog gathering and lifting its skirts,
to the bent flowers weary of standing straight.
