One day my sister appears <br />at an Art fair <br />near the Scituate farmland <br /> <br />When I see her she is sitting <br />in a wheelchair, <br />her body wrapped in a shawl. <br /> <br />Swollen knees with brown <br />leather braces. She <br />whispers, I cant dance now. <br /> <br />She shows me an old picture <br />of the two of us, we were <br />standing near Santa Claus <br />downtown in the fifties. <br /> <br />'When the Winter comes, <br />I think of you <br />and your birthday in December, ' <br />my sister began. <br /> <br />She told me she had <br />been meaning to call me. <br />Her dog died. Her daughter <br />moved out. <br /> <br />You look the same, she <br />tells me, that same round face <br />and doll hair. She laughs. <br /> <br />You should have seen me <br />dancing in Vegas, she brags, <br />The ballroom light dashing <br />against the wall, the music <br />blasting me deaf. <br /> <br />My sister reaches down <br />to rub her knees <br />Age is cruel, she says <br />Bones were never meant to last.<br /><br />Louise Marie DelSanto<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/dancing-in-las-vegas/
