after Randall Jarrell
Moving from Certainty to Serenity, from Serenity
to Depends, I take a box of panty liners
and add it to my Greek yogurt, my blueberries,
my narrow, seedless cucumber, safely wrapped.
The front wheel of my cart waggles and drags.
I don’t miss the girl I imagined I was, I miss
the girl I actually was and didn’t know. Before
I reach the register I am frantic with heat,
so I gaze at a wall of toothpastes without blinking:
polishing, whitening, enamel-repair. I miss
fewer choices: one wrinkled tube
of Crest in the medicine cabinet. I stand
and wait it out, my hands lightly
against the cool of my shopping cart,
until I can move down the aisle, past Total,
past Life, past all the Lucky Charms.