Old Ladies

I was 23,

and I invited all the old ladies

who lived in our

apartment complex

on White Settlement Road

over for coffee.

The lady who

gave me her clothes

and stood watch at her window

each morning as

I left for work,

hoping to catch me

wearing them.

The lady whose caretaker

made the best cornbread

I’ve ever eaten

before or since.

I used our wedding-gift

Mr. Coffee

for the first time,

churning out

an iced-tea colored brew.

I cleaned our

dining room floor

with Pledge,

turning it into

a skating rink for those

precariously mobile ladies

who depended upon my quick

elbow-grabbing

to forestall their future

broken hips.

In the years that followed,

when my children were born

and we raised them

miles away from

Fort Worth, Texas,

those ladies perished

without a thought from me.

My care for them

was brief and shallow

and more about me

and my need to neighbor well,

but I wonder what it meant

to them?