All Comes Down

Propped up against the headboard

She calmly smoothes the cotton sheet

With knarled arthritic fingers,

Examining the faded flower pattern.

In lucid moments she tells me that

I look so much like my father.

“He was the handsomest man I ever met.”

And then there are those days she claims

Someone has stolen her purse,

By careful count the night before

By naked eye she saw eight thousand stars,

The food is poison,

Her mother and father, who work the front desk here,

Will confirm this fact,

Her roommate is the devil.

My mind spins round her sun and shadow.