It is eleven o’clock
Etta is a small woman,
stylishly dressed.
Her smile enrobes one.
In Paris Etta taught English to Chanel.
She talks of trolleys pulled by horses in Manhattan.
She chats in lively fashion
of today’s events and mores.
Her spectacle lenses are fishbowls.
Her eyes, magnified, dart and glisten
in their depths.
She sees very little
and takes in all.
At one hundred,
Etta is au courant.
Her watch talks to her.
It is eleven fifteen.
– Carrie McLeod Howson
