Jet-black-bottled, short hair
not the brown I’d seen in youthful pictures.
Bulbous nose.
Between her nearly hairless eyebrow
and eyelid with a fold like a roman shade,
a hanging mole.
I feared its snagged removal
from her cupped fingers
as she dug in her sunken sockets
letting her dark framed glasses
ride on her index fingers.
Her mangled-straight pinky finger
escaped amputation, ready
for hot tea. Islands
of lost pigment on her arm and leg
Float in a sea of brown.
Unshod squared feet
tamped down snow.
Always a white blouse
usually a kick pleat straight skirt.
But her mouth, was there lipstick?
Her small ears, were there earrings?