\nas droplets of water struggle to make melody on lips,
\nthen fall, for no other purpose than to inhabit space,
\nlike corpses, like the dead reaching for the towel;
\nbetween woman and water, there remains;
\na grace of rubbing under the armpits,
\nstroking the back, almost a song in the throat
\nbut no: sorrow would never yield to joy.
\nNot in a bathroom. Not in a face that
\nfears so hard, so willfully, the steamed-up mirror.
\nA shower-cap is not a hole in which a woman might hide.
\nIt is not a shining circle where God makes his rounds.
\nAnd it’s neither peace, nor murder,
\njust something to fit neatly when nothing else will.
\nBut body dry, towel hung on the rack, bathrobe
\ntightened around the waist, cap comes off,
\nhair falls down upon her shoulders.
\nShe’s arthritic, seventy-five, widowed, wrinkled and gray.
\nSo there you have it. The cap’s off.
\nAre you pleased with yourselves, voyeurs.
\n
\n
\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.artvilla.com\/plt\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/01\/File0005-V3.jpg\")
<\/a>\n
\n
\nJohn Grey is an Australian poet, US resident. Recently published in the Homestead Review, Harpur Palate and Columbia Review, Dunes Review, Poetry East and North Dakota Quarterly with work upcoming in Haight-Ashbury Literary Journal, Thin Air, Dalhousie Review.
\n
\n
\n
\n
\n
\nRobin Ouzman Hislop is Editor of Poetry Life and Times<\/a> ; his publications include
\n
\nAll the Babble of the Souk<\/em> <\/a>, Cartoon Molecules<\/em> and Next Arrivals<\/em>, collected poems, as well as translation of Guadalupe Grande\u00b4s La llave de niebla, as Key of Mist<\/em> <\/a> and the recently published Tesserae<\/em> <\/a> <\/u>, a translation of Carmen Crespo\u00b4s Teselas.
\n
\nYou may visit Aquillrelle.com\/Author Robin Ouzman Hislop <\/a>about author. See Robin performing his work Performance (University of Leeds)<\/a><\/p>\n