Life is short and I still haven’t
slept with a married man, swum
in a fairy pool fringed by gorse
on the Isle of Skye, or swallowed
a gold ring. My finger
in another’s mouth: been there. What key
opens the shed where I keep the spare?
A ring of petals rests on the table
because I touched the yellow flower
I suspected of being dead. All gone,
all gone is the song of the baby
who has eaten all her food. All gone,
the days when I could have been
doing my undones and been, perhaps,
undone. Oh wait, hold on, I slept
with a married man not long ago.
He was my husband. My days go on.
Cecily Parks is the author of three poetry collections, including The Seeds, forthcoming from Alice James Books in 2025. She teaches in the MFA program at Texas State University.
This article appeared in the print edition of the magazine with the headline Gold Ring.
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