John Grey
She can’t relate
the withered, wizened man,
wrapped in hospital sheets,
to the strapping sicko
who defiled her
way back in her twelfth year.
His hands can barely touch,
let alone fondle.
His mouth barely
raises a sound.
It sure as hell can’t say,
“Now don’t you
tell anyone.”
Family crowd his bed
but he doesn’t recognize anyone.
Not his children.
Not even himself.
The end’s so obviously near
that all eyes but hers
are soaked with tears.
She knows that
she should feel a little sad
that death is coming for him.
But there’s still so much of her
that wishes
she was that death.
John Grey is an Australian poet, US resident, recently published in New World Writing, North Dakota Quarterly and Tenth Muse. Latest books, Between Two Fires, Covert and Memory Outside The Head are available through Amazon. Work upcoming in Haight-Ashbury LIterary Journal, Birmingham Arts Journal, La Presa and Shot Glass Journal.