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Widow, Falling

Tell me how to live this beautiful life.

Tell me now.
Help me to make bracelets from tin cans

Christmas wrap from potatoes cut into stars and toilet paper

a gourmet meal from sautéed dice of pillowcase and

hot rollers en brochette
to change my watch to an elastic bandage 

to drive safely when I am blind

to know when I collapse, how to fall

to read the eyes of strangers when they ask me for change to get home

to ask strangers for change so I can get home,

in their eyes, and mine

to know when I am home and how to act when I am there.


Help me when I collapse.



Pamela Manché Pearce


Published in “The Widows’ Handbook Poetry Anthology,” Kent State University Press 2014