Her hands,
otters smoothwrithing
over one another.

Her eyes,
cracked shells
of bleary blue. 

Her entire wardrobe
worn at once, layered
cake of threadbare grime.

Sparse hair
that might recall blonde
through the gray.

Her words 
a barked aria of 
alien post-meaning.

Stop staring, stop 
listening; she won’t stop
being.

This morning
I restrung my oldest guitar
and recognized shifts in her tone
that might herald an imminent end
to her sweet singing: old wood
drying out, joints beginning to give,
intonation falling away into slight discord;
all I could say was,
“Well, there goes her pleasure,
in parallel to my own.” 

There are other guitars to be played.
What lifetime we shared
is nearly over.
No sorrow,
no tears, no panic; no regrets.
It’s just the way it is —

a great paradox
of growing old
is that you will be so bothered
by realizing how many things
don’t bother you anymore.

I play her anyway,
my thick fingers missing notes
I used to catch with ease,
her second string buzzing ever so slightly
when left open to ring,

barely noticing the quickening decay
at all. 

I watch a moth
strike repeatedly
at a candle flame
until she falls
in ruins.

I shudder
because that,
I suspect,
is how the future
begins and ends:

in attraction,
obsession,
entrapment,
and at last
a release
that costs you
everything you have.