ALONE ON GREEN STREET

Alone on Green Street, on the sixth floor, in apartment 620,

my mother has positioned a chair, facing South over the park.

In her one room dusty studio, she sits and watches, --

the bird shit collecting on her ledge, fire trucks sailing by

racing to distant emergencies, elsewhere. Thank God.

Each morning the sun rises, each evening it sets.

She considers venturing down, she'd love a Herseys bar,

a Sprite, a pack of smokes, but she can't gather the

determination to get out of her comfy flannel pajamas.

And the thought of having to talk to people, to count change,

to navigate streets and keys, stirs up panic. Just checking the

mail is too much, too complicated. She'd rather stay put, safe

in her chair. She dives into her photo albums - she can remember

long ago. That's easy. It's her short term that's gone- for now.

That and just about everything else. She holds her memories like

a light in the darkest night and prays that they won't desert her.