A True Poem

She has viney
tattoos from her
fingertips

to her throat,
spiky hair,
huge brown eyes.

Elfin-like, she
greets me. I'm
in the Apple store

and she is helping
me set up
my new iPad.

While we wait
for my apps
to download,

she tells me
she is buying
one like this

for her mom
as a Hanukkah
gift. I ask her

what apps
are must-haves
I don't already have.

She shows me
her Pinterest
page full

of wedding
ideas. And
that leads us

to her dreams.
"I'm slowly
falling in love

with my boyfriend,"
she tells me
shyly.

I ask
her how to turn
autocapitalization

off in Pages.
"I write poetry
and hate

having the first
word in each
line capitalized."

She agrees
and shows me.
She's thirty,

ready for a family.
She tells me
her boyfriend

is Italian.
"I just got back
from Italy."

I tell her.
She says Italian
men

are so different
from Americans.
"I shouldn't

show you this
but look at these texts
he sends me."

Clouds of poetry
fill her iPhone
screen.

I show her
my latest blog
post. Sunrise

photos float by
as I scroll
down.

I enlarge one
magical with
blurry orange bokeh.

I forget
I'm a frumpy grandma
of sixty-three.

The rest
of the store
disappears.

We are a bubble
of connected
opposites.

I should look
like her,
inked and edgy.

She should be me
rich with a husband
and children.