FOUR POEMS
Miriam N. Kotzin

PORTRAIT
Miriam N. Kotzin

Even today you make your rounds.
You go from room to room, make
notes, and do
    always the expected.
Nor are you proud
    of it. You see goiters and rashes,
never the injured heart.
         But once you
glimpse a shadow flicker
in a corner
and only an empty white coat
hangs
from a hook, and yet you
almost spoke.
And once you find yourself
in the mirror
and as you lean forward, checking
for five o'clock
shadow in the blue
fluorescent light, you watch
as you
slowly disappear.

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