80spoems/tolive

TO LIVE

Ultimately, she did
what women have always done,
what all women have always
done. Kept going.
Sweeping up the pieces,
knowing comprehension was a bonus
which might or might not come.
Comprehension was a bonus
and choice a blessing.
Living a responsibility,
choosing to live a necessity.
To keep going was at first
a reflex. She chose to live
and to alter as was necessary
to survive. She chose to
keep going, altering what she
had to, in order to survive,
comprehending what could
not be altered.
She put on her sweater,
swept up the pieces
and continued to live.