I've read recently about murder wrinkles and think I saw them once on a woman about my age. We're always pictured either desperately content or desperately not, either wearing bird watching jackets and gardening gloves, or red lipstick and long cigarettes. And dark glasses. I think about this while wandering the parking lot looking for my car. And about Leonard Cohen. How did he love all those women and end up alone? All those breasts, and red mouths, and bird analogies, all those rivers and petals. Seven decades and there's still no one to say, "Why don't you turn on the radio Lenny, and sit by me awhile. We could play cards, listen to Satchemo." I'm looking for Leonard Cohen at the new Bookshelf but it's Monday and the place is usually empty like this, just a few robins around the self-aware section, clutching their cloth shopping bags. I forget I'm not wearing bellbottoms and tie-dye anymore, with a flower in the buttonhole of my blue sweater. Murder wrinkles. I googled it, of course. Turns out, everyone wants to know.
This poem was published in Contemporary American Voices along with five other pieces in 2011. It springs from a facebook ad titled “Murder Wrinkles”