Often I say I write to stop time,
but I am wrong. Time is visible
in this wheeled chair
whose arm no longer lifts;
in this memory of a pink silken
night jacket, the one shopped
for my mother when she entered the hospital,
for one must always look nice
for the doctor; the lacy
collar unlike anything
she would normally wear.
I see it in front of me
as if it were a hummingbird,
its pink wings fluttering
across her shoulders.
She covers her arms
not just because the hospital
room was so cold, but
flabby arms must be camouflaged
before the doctor makes his rounds.
*
I look at Alice Neel’s Self-Portrait.
Naked, she leans forward
in her blue and white striped sitting chair,
a long paint brush held in one hand
crosses over her breasts;
her stomach sits on her lap.
I notice one foot, its toes raised
as if she is stretching them or thinking
about getting up, or humming
a song. She looks out at the viewer
with a solidness,
an honesty, her mind alive,
her glasses a bit crooked.
*
And the pink night jacket
holds time in its shape
of my mother in a cold hospital
as she tries to look alert
for the doctor, to sway him
into thinking she is fine,
better than fine, because
she is dressed
with a hint of lipstick and lace.
