Nursing Home Romance

She sets her sappy sadness down,
lets the bliss-blisters smooth her features
back, somehow, to when she felt younger,
thinner,
more self-involved
but happier,
back when she held her figure better
than she ever held her liquor
and boys lined up to hold her hair back,
spewed love-lines, vomited adoration
that looked like every love they'd masticated,
swallowed, played like it was cool to look emasculated
(but ultimately in control).
She sets her sappy-sadness down,
frowns at her faded features--
fruit salad lunch made of pear shapes, sour grapes,
and wondering if anyone
would still take the time to kindle/rekindle
whatever.

Me, I'll play the love-struck frog
that goes for the throat, leaves bitemarks
in shallow-loving listless afternoons
playing "this house is a caslte with
a drawbridge made of plywood"
just for an excuse
to still call her my princess.