A Grandmother's Regrets Poem by Amanda Purczynski

A gray old woman sits all alone.
Unloved and unknown.
Dreaming of days past long ago.
Skin once like porcelain,
now wrinkled like paper.
The once young girl,
skipping to Grandmother's house.
Only now,
she has no basket to hold her youth.
They played a part
in a long fixed fable,
beast and prey.
He promised her a heart so big
with eyes wide open,
saying “It was the better to love with.”
Now she wonders
what he could possibly know
about the affairs of the heart.
With his sheep suit on
she was blinded to her instincts,
howling
and pleading for her,
to run.
He took her sanguine eyes.
And with a quick flash
of hidden fangs,
he swallowed her heart whole.
She is left with the bitter taste
of regret and longing,
in the back of her throat.
Like eating glass
and chasing it down with whiskey.
Her stomach left full of stones,
as heavy as a cemetery.
And yet,
she waits for him.
Her wolf
and his prize
of a worthy hunt.