The patience of the old woman:
raveling and unraveling
somebody’s memories
like skeins of wool,
to darn the tattered covering
of an ever-fading life
in which,
according to somebody’s memories,
she was once a woman
and a wife.

The patience of the sick:
waiting for the stab of the hypodermic
to bring oblivion,
while the night nurse
smothers a yawn,
waiting for the day nurse
to relieve her;
and the dawn
allows a little more greyness
into the room.

The patience of Life itself:
so patiently
propelling a single breath.

Patience lost,
evaporation
at the merest suggestion
of Death!

.