That She Almost Thought Was Really Swell Poem by Robert Rorabeck

Dime store reservoirs in her eyes:
She looks across the sea and gives it quiet things,
Gives it time:
She has so much lost that she would have to say to
Me;
And I am unperfected, divided and ready for the fall,
Ready for the crawl of giant ants over my
Toppled hall:
I didn’t even work today, though I knew that I should;
But I thought of her,
Knowing that she must be up to no good- Her faith
Crawling along her ankle, taking its
Time,
Her body as hot as a tortoise on a rock;
And she was twisted and lost before she even got
To kindergarten,
Thrown out of the nursery of her garden, she took care
Of her siblings in a chicken coop,
And I watched her from across the canal of torpid
Noncommittance; and she seemed to see me there for
A moment like a dream
Of something cheap but amusing that she almost
Thought was really swell.