Their Once Beautiful Wives
Author: Bill Roberts
Thinning, scraggly hair,
moist red eyes, heavy-lidded,
puffy face, eternally frowning,
chins double, triple, quad,
shoulders caved forward
as if in defeat, probably defeat,
breasts slouching without muscle,
bellies in the tenth month
of another pregnancy,
butt with no definition whatever,
wrinkled skin on legs,
purpled with varicose rivers,
feet nearly always bare,
toenails yellow, untended.
What must they think of them,
these once wondrous specimens -
the charming guys they married,
their once beautiful wives?
NOTE: A poem to misguide the reader into thinking I’m describing the aging female of couples when, lo and behold, it’s the males who most often dissipate with age.
