Beatrice Poem by Taylor Rosewood

Beatrice rides shotgun, just like a dog,
until she runs out of gas and walks home
by herself, past the cantina where where
she used to take names- sixteen and pristine-
like a newly minted coin.

She's heavier than then, with eyes that gently
plead, that extract you like a mineral from the
corner of a room. Their warmth and their hazel
have diminished over time, so she pretends
they're baby blue, and what's real she tries to
hide.

'I'm going back to school, ' she's been telling a
few old friends, and her mother, with her hopes
up, lends her the rent, but it never seems to work-
there's some guy that comes along- then the rent
is overdue, and her modest dream is gone,

until she's there again, riding shotgun with a friend,
in the parking lot at church, where the movie theater
is, looking out the window on the things she might
have been- with the kids, and the vows, and a
minivan, or two- or alone in her husband's house
on a rainy afternoon.