Young, youthful love never dies as a storm settles,
or as the waves break against the beech.
The skin, once soft as the finest silk,
withers and bleaches with the turning of the tide.
The soft, full lips of the blossoming maiden when met,
nurture the wet of the gentle caller.
The hips settle and the stomach wiggles,
as the moon makes it round and round.
Crows' feet deck the sandy corners of the gray,
yet grayer eyes of the old fallen flapper.
Her hair stiffens and all pigments are lost,
with the wisp of the dying, though treacherous westerly wind.
Fingers and toes, jaundiced with age,
dangle the edges of the starchy white sterile bed.
The sun illuminates her through the dirty pane glass,
and a shadow falls upon her face from fake, dusty flowers on the sill.
Her lips have flattened with each snowy winter,
and her heart has slowed like the snowflake in its last foot.
Each breath comes with pain for her,
who breezed the fields of Queens Ann's Lace in youth.
Her dress clipped the edges of each tender petal,
in her glorious path home from the one room school.
Home to the smell of fresh apple pie and a burning woodstove,
stoked with a plethora of gathered timber.
I watch closely as the days do pass for me.
I watch how quickly the next day comes.
I watch the moon settle over the lake each night with splendor,
and I appreciate the short time a snowflake has.
My tide is full of lingering wonder but yet,
the sun shall rise without my beckoning.
Justin Pride "Jake" O'Brien
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