FLOWER WOMAN

She must be in her fifties now.
Flower child woman
with skin growing old gently and softly.
Her hair is the same as it was at Woodstock
or wherever it was she was young:
long and full and straight, and
looking slightly incongruous now that it's grey.
No makeup.
Full lips.
Calm eyes.
Clothes that snub their nose at fashion.
The things she dropped out of she dropped for life.
I saw her again today.
Not the same woman,
but the same life written on a different face.
There's beauty here
and it always takes me by surprise.
She wears her aging so gracefully.
So unconsciously.
As if it would never occur to her to tamper with it.
I admire the courage and honesty of her appearance,
but have to acknowledge that I find it also appalling.
Seeing her makes me uncomfortably aware
that I am fighting the tide
and she is flowing easily with it.
Do I give her too much credit?
Do I endow her with noble self-acceptance
when it's really simple resignation?
In the end it doesn't matter.
She'd probably no sooner be me
than I would ever be her.


© Ellen Azorin