Ruth Lepson

AUNT DORA

You call when you want to tell me something happy--Ted's taking you to dinner at Pier 1, then you'll play Scrabble--or a girlfriend's coming for dessert and coffee.

I'm sitting on a bench by a pier and there's a wicker love seat bobbing peacefully on the small dock in front of me: how little of your life you lived

leisurely, and when things got worse you got sweeter--and I wonder why I spent my time on some who gave me little pieces of metal, glitter, or why I wondered who there was to love me.

You tell me, don't do what I did--marry again or you'll be sorry. While you, past hope of remarrying, read your joke books and laugh tenderly in the middle of the night when pain, anonymous, has kept you awake.

It's you who have learned who loves you. There you were, all my life long.

Knowing She was Loved

bright as that moon pin

above the grey trees of the cemetery

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pastel matching shoes and bag

not sad gold but sweet silver

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while Dora was moving on

the wake of the boat

smudged the glints in the water

the glint in her eye still evident

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sweet small Dora in the bed

her right breast bruised

legs dotted with blood

we think of peacefulness together

say we’ll think of it apart

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thunder to think

everything’s Paris

Dora was in Paris

Dora sits lightly in my heart

© Ruth Lepson

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