The inmates at the old-age home
Are disrobing. In the assembly room
Dressing gowns fall from sunken shoulders,
Foundational garments pool
Around flat arches and twisted toes.

Stats don’t lie: seven of every ten
Seniors are women, but the handful of men
Here drop trou from gaunt flanks, allow
Bellies and scrotums to sag and sway
As the women free flat fallen breasts

From all restraint, stand shy or proud
As becomes them, gray or white locks
Freed from caps or bands and spilled
About their faces and down their backs,
Airing out decrepit bodies whose cells

Still continue to replace themselves.
Handelsman has an erection
And leers at Madeline Albrecht,
Whose plump breasts still have heft
And whose desire to copulate has never

Left her. Will they have a go at each
Other right there amidst their neighbors,
Will they leave the hall for privacy’s sake –
Propriety’s not an issue – or will they
Just totter gaily on display?

I can no longer wait to enter the room,
My uniform whites announcing 
All Souls’ Night is spent. I help them dress
And herd them back to their rooms
To dream the dark away, a few,

At least, refreshed by the spell
That fell like a flash on dying flesh.