gray clock

unzipping the back
of Mrs. Parnell’s
nylon dress
when I was new
to the glorious sensory world
wondering about breasts
whether they were soft
like dreams or
firm like facts
and smelling her
hair that was
a bouquet of exotic
flowers not grown
in those desolate parts
of my family’s
fallow farmland
and slipping that staticy dress
down over her hips
I can see as clear
as a brookie
in a sunlit pool
and today
Mrs. P.
flirts with shadows
the flowers I bring
she will never see
or smell
as I’m a few days too late
for memories
or even
idle chit chat
her daughters
not knowing me
not knowing even
a murmur of my past
whisking me
away from their
dying mom
I get it
I so get it
but they
will never
know
nor should they
about me and Mrs. P’s
nylon dress
and how
this industrious woman
explored that universe with me
where seduction
and curiosity
can be friends
before the arrival
of blotchy
age spots and flabby arms
in a death bed
pen
a dark declaratory sentence

leaving the sterile
squeaky hospital
I glance up
at the gray clock
and hear it tic
humming to me and
Mrs. P