The Beauty That Was Mine

it pricks, this ego of mine, locked tooth and nail
in an image no longer real, but still as much me
as my hair like spilled coffee,
now here and there,
touched lightly with stark silver.
It remembers carrying skin like rich fat cream,
now coarser and veined with bits of threadbare dream.
It remembers the sway of shapely thigh,
plushness, of lovely breasts of white - blue, fresh skimmed.
of a belly softly rounded, a hillock gently rising
and wonders at this form swaddled in inelegance
it remembers the curve of an arm deep browned
and glowing gold in the sun.
It rebukes this limb, loose skinned and solid as an oak.
these eyes once sparked, and quicksilver bright
that teased and gleamed now tamed and faded.
It is shamed this ego of mine, taunted back to present day
When it will not give away, the beauty that was mine.