She studies her clothes
From time to time
As they flutter in the sea breeze
On a wire clothesline.

Some days the wind is so strong
Her clothes take wings.
Some days they hang in the rain
Dark and dripping.

Sitting on the terrace in a rocker,
She smells Sweet Alyssum,
She hears the buzz of bees,
Today her clothes
Hanging in the stillness of a cloudy day.
Grapevines now overtake the line,
There is less room each day to hang them.
” Soon it will be time to leave, “
She thinks as she drinks café con leche.

Sometimes hanging there,
Threadbare, baggy clothes
Of a middle-aged woman traveling,
Single bed sheets,
Well worn towels,
Pretty nightgowns,
Old blue slippers holes sewn shut,
The last pair her mother gave her.

She considers.
What do her clothes
Reveal about her life?
Secretly,
She marks her time, her place
As with a bookmark in a book.

She pours a last cup of coffee,
Her thoughts
Like the clouds adrift,
Elsewhere.