No flower, May,
curls of stiff whiskers
twisting on her chin,
she bobbed her bulbous knees
through a shaggy lifetime robe
hanging over grim toenails
when we smoked on the wooden steps
of the back porch of the house
she and Henry rented;
laughed how crazy our lives were:
me, a grocery boy with a lunatic dad,
a kid who carried her a cardboard box
of canned soups, stews and baked beans
Tuesdays and Fridays;
she, so busted and beaten down some days
she could have been a leaf
flattened on a wet spring sidewalk
I never met Henry, the postal clerk
she rarely saw in daylight
Never knew why she stayed,
lips split and swollen,
staring all day at the treetops,
smoking, waiting for Henry
to stumble up the stairs
At thirteen, watching May blush
on one of those afternoons
when she spoke his name wideeyed,
lift her chin bemused
and flick another ash,
I only knew I didn’t know much