Wispy Widow

She offers me milk for my bones as hers lose strength,
the cow is “just around the back”, it’s “no trouble at all”…
I have not been here, to see her in years and everything is pristine,
as he left it
when he left her.
She smiles as I decline, her eyes remain
Hollow
Distant
Patient; looking
to their reunion.
We talk, small talk of Heaven, of Hell. She is certain he waits for her, and they shall sip milk and honey together
Underneath the shade of a Willow
(her favourite tree).
And what of these pains, these obstacles to cross?
She sees no boundaries, questions nothing, all healing with time, she’s learned to respect the laws of fate.
In her youth, she recalls, she was headstrong, deviant, at war with the world,
felt rejected, ostracized by biological difference,
‘Chiney Mama’, I call her now, ‘Dirty Coolie ’, they stoned her then.
In time, with experience, new perspective helped harden her skin, condition her mind, to neutralize the blows.

-Atlas