Bystanders

When my thoughts happen on this summer,
veer off at your 80th birthday,
stop on the image of you,

I take in the effort you’ve made,
your starched floral dress,
the blush across your falling cheeks,

the soft rose hue smeared on your lips,
your ever-bright orange hair pulled into a barrette,
one hand clutching your eccentric purse.

But my attention strays, sticking,
on the deep purple sitting above your eye,
the color stark on your cream face.

Even my mind is reluctant to wander over
to the much younger, much rounder man at your side,
the one you’ve been with twenty years;

the one who made your waning mind believe
it was Christmas two weeks early just for the fun 
of watching you frantic for a few hours;

the one who makes no secret
of waiting for your end, for his chance to snatch
the house your schoolteacher’s salary supplied;

the one who’s gained the weight you lost,
the one I heard make you yelp in pain,
the one who believes children don’t count as witnesses;

the one who stole your freedom.

And I wonder if, in two decades, anyone has stood up,
and why they don’t now, and if anyone ever asked 
if you’re happy, insisted on an answer.

Are they afraid of the five foot man?
Do they think back to his time spent in prison
for holding a gun to someone’s throat? (I do.)

But there are so many more of us than him.
Why haven’t we done something?
Why haven’t I?

I start to wonder if maybe the reason
your lips only pull ever so slightly skyward,
and only once or twice -

on this would-be joyous day about you, 
surrounded by the breadth of your family,
singing you songs and praise -

is because it must be strange
to love and be loved, and yet
not have a single person inquire

as to why there is a silver-dollar sized mark
on your face, a mark you couldn’t -
or wouldn’t - cover today.

It must be lonely to realize, again, in the sea 
of your closest kin, no one seems to see you,
your everyday, your being swallowed piece by piece.

When each of us has been kind enough
to help women off the street in harm’s way,
why haven’t we done more to help you?

If a movie were made of us,
one that shines upon secrets loathe to come to light,
would this be ours?