“Are you okay?”,
my wife asks
when I cough.

“No. I’m fine.
Yes. I’m not”,
I respond,

stumping her
in the poetic irony
of words that

encompass the
yes and no
and the in between.

She flips the finger
at me and I return
the bird to the nest.

We go back to our life
and our tablets,
the drip, drip of my chemo
and I wonder about okay.

“No.  You’re fine.
Yes. You’re not.”,
the bag stares in response.

In her gauzy garments
Above the bowing trees
The moon has many lovers
In the sighing breeze.

They all take her dancing
In exotic lands
They give her sparkling diamonds
They kiss her milk-white hands.

She is round & fullsome
Or slender as a waif
When she is then waning
Her flowers are kept safe.

Silken skeins of darkness
When she's waxing full
Are parted by her brightness
She is NEVER dull!

Her beaux are all so courtly
But she eschews them all
Her only love can make her pale
She burns at his call...

She lets out her moonbeams
Through her eyes they weep
She loves the one eclipsing her
They can NEVER meet!

She, so strong within her court
Will curtsey when he comes
The moon has many lovers

But she's taken by the SUN.


Catherine Jarvis
(C) 12/14/2019