A flowered handkerchief
blue, red and yellow
once a common companion
carried in pocket or purse
in case of a sneeze
or to wipe an ice dream drip
from a child’s cheek
Its most noble service?
wiping tears of grief
for a life so brief
What purpose now?
In a shop--there
lovely, lacey, flowered hankerchiefs
piled in a basket
purchased on a whim—because
"they are pretty"
I have one in my drawer
twenty years since placed there--
crumpled, mostly unnoticed
among a picture, a trinket, a note
an oddity to be found
perhaps when my brief candle burns out
A handkerchief of dried tears--
a memory to one
of service to none--
of service to none--
Then who will remember her?
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