You freely shared your apples, content not to ask for oranges.
Pearls at my feet,
dime-store cheap, lustrous nevertheless.
But the stash of womanly wisdom, 
of how to love while keeping your own shape intact
was empty. 
It had been
plucked out long ago when 
you were just a girl looking to the world for joy
and received nothing but bitter ashes fried in butter. 

How can I find fault with the cavern inside you
when you have wallpapered it with such care?

I thought your hammered copper exterior was a fashion 
picked up over the years and never updated.
I see now every dent and divot is a wound that you wear like
costume jewelry
your mother-in-law left for you in a ziplock bag.  

You never tried to straighten the bent rib of the umbrella.
Instead you tucked yourself into the small protected corner
grateful for the respite from the weather. 
You held me close seeking to keep me dry 
when all I wanted was to 
run in the rain. 
I tried,
I tried to quell my yearning to dance in the storm, 
bury the urge to jump without looking for a net,
until I realized I couldn’t settle for 
anything less than apples 
and 
oranges.