by Sharon Scholl
She marks the hours by duties done,
minutes melting into memorized routines
performed as liturgies of love.
Her days are torn from nature’s fabric,
wrinkled by the weight of one broken
body, the mottled pattern of its symptoms.
The house generates its weather,
ruled by machines that create air,
light, the tides of warm bath water.
Time here has shed dimensions,
cast off past and future, narrowed
to one endless present.
She dares not dream of what could be
outside these walls, another time or place
for fear she might weep from longing.
***
Sharon Scholl is a retired college teacher who convenes a poetry critique group and maintains a website (freeprintmusic.com) of original music and poetry for small, liberal churches. Her poetry chapbooks, Seasons, Remains, Evensong, are available via Amazon Books. Her poems are current in Third Wednesday and The Bluebird Word.
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