It's Still Life

A Minute’s Deliberation

‘You look like a hundred year old piece
of Gorgonzola,’ she says, ‘or a cabbage leaf.’

Five minutes later, she is still talking
but I’ve forgotten to listen by then. There’s
a lot of mileage in a nod and a smile.

This is a woman who I’d introduce
as my friend, but truthfully … she is
insufferable. She is the eyes and ears
and whispers of the neighbourhood.
She is perpetual and persistent with it all,
like a mule who never stops, who’d flare
its nose, gasp and die rather than quit.
I didn’t reply, just drew in a breath.

‘Would you believe,’ she started, but
I was already caught slightly wayward.
‘…they thought so, but who knows,’ she says.

The ash from her cigarette hung long,
a deformed appendage, a curving fingernail.
And then it fell like a shadow as she
raises her hand above her head.

‘Tall as a horse’s back,’ she says, ‘high as this.’

I have no idea what she’s talking about
but she is pacing with a listless grace.
I envy her that. I walk like a postman;
genetics, I suppose. Dad was a postman.
And Mum was a dinner lady at my school,
so listless grace wasn’t on her radar either.
I was never meant to be a pretty girlie-girl.

‘and her eyes are blue, dilated like a plate,’
she frowns. ‘…gone blind, totally blind,’

And I say, ‘Nobody can predict a scandal.’

It seems like a sensible thing to say,
but her frown deepens,

‘What are you talking about?’ she asks.

I gave her question only a minute’s deliberation.

for Miz Quickly Day 20: Dialogue