THE RUMINATIONS OF AUNT AGATHA
Any less clothes and they’d be naked, she says.
And how loud they are.
I don’t even have to eavesdrop.
So aggressive, they open their own doors,
barge right through.
Freedom, they call it
Unmarried, it was in my day.
And sex…you can read it in their faces.
They’ve had their share all right,
though they’d shudder if they knew
what their men thought of them.
It’s a scandal that they believe they’ll brazen out
but not with me they won’t
Whatever happened to propriety and duty.
Can’t even cook, some of them.
And when did long red varnished finger-nails ever darn a sock.
I sometimes wish I was deaf and blind
so I wouldn’t be aware of this:
I’d only see inside myself,
confine my thoughts to how I’ve led my life.
I could die knowing I fulfilled my obligations.
Even though I had none to fulfill.
