POCKET SHRINK

                 Maria's Day

His ninety-three year old hand
cannot extract
a scratchy something inside his shirt.
Busy arguing, his daughers are oblivious.
They have been fighting for sixty years.
No matter.
They keep him clean, fed and medicated
in a routine tight as a girdle.
He strives not to be a burden
is appreciative and apologetic
except on Fridays
when the daughters turn him over to Maria.
And today is Friday.

She enters smiling.
"Mr. Moore, how are today?"
she says as if excited to see him.
She kisses him on the cheek
and her misty, curly hair brushes over him
as if his face were a valued antique.
Always, they begin their time together with the weekly news
he, his health, his spirits, his impatient daughters
she, her lopsided love life.
She has a boyfriend they call Fungus because he comes and goes
and she cannot rid herself of him because she loves him.
She likes to scold.  "You did not eat your lunch.
Why didn't you comb your hair for me?
There is jam on your handsome face."
While she feeds him, bathes him, dresses him
she hums or sings and sometimes, if he asks, shows him salsa steps.
On Maria nights, he sleeps well, safe as a bundled baby.
She sits beside him on the bed and togethr they laugh and say, "Cuddle tiime."
It's ridculous, he knows, doesn't care.
His head against her shoulder, she holds his hand, speaks lulling Spanish words.
A clever, coprprate man with years of power and positon
he wonders if he is sliding into senility
has heard his daughers' whispers.
What they don't know
what he only recently knows
is
he feels loved.

Bridget Harwell