Bernadine Lortis

She pretends I’m not here

hoping I’ll pretend I don’t see her
sitting there in silent profile
without the slightest turn of her head

looking straight forward as if a personal operetta
is being performed on a miniature stage
and she dare not shift or she’d miss a note,

but that single eye,

that shiny black marble, fierce
as a fiery opal from inside the labyrinth
of the lacy lilac tree,

follows each movement I make

knowingly aware that her life’s creation
is at stake from nothing more than sharp shears
that could trim the branch from within

though I doubt she’d give in
without waging all-out war.