Ageism

by Amy Soricelli

She is old under her face deep into her skin.
Her eyes brown crowded into themselves dark, twisty
she sees dark and twisty.
She would say -
hey this is me - this is me;
she wore it like a sign/an ankle bracelet - thin fragile.
She was sexy in her lonely scared ways.
Like the numbers on the ruler -you saw them/ you didn't.
She was older than she was younger...closer to now than to almost was.
Pecked-out fragments.lost in the spaces between the plant and the dirt.
Rings on the tree around and around she sees her hands
in long dark fingers pointing backwards.
She is old under the shadows on the dark dirty street.
Gum under desks the way it feels rough -
other peoples shame stuck hard into the tip of her fingers.
She closes her eyes tight she can borrow the memory;
the pink long ago sweet worn down to nothing.
To nothing.
she is old under her skin deep into her soul.