The unarmored
shoes she dons
leave space in the toe
for a soul. A phantom
hanging on her thigh
slips past
the mind’s
control.
Circles she’s in
wheel slowly.
She cracks jokes that go over
like lead.
The flag once borne
on a shoulder
now fatigues a frame
by her bed.
Eyes that once
were beside
watch her recede
into light; pills
the VA prescribed
count down
like rounds
in a fight.
YOU MIGHT ALSO LIKE
Cardinal Dolan: By No Means Finished Yet
There’s a steakhouse on East 50th Street in midtown Manhattan, to which Cardinal Timothy Dolan and I…
The Ones Who Didn’t Convert
Melanie McDonagh’s Converts, reviewed in First Things last month, allows us to gaze close-up at the extraordinary…
Cancer and the Cure of Souls
"I have cancer,” the elderly woman announced from her hospital bed high above York Avenue in Manhattan.…
