Valerie wore a turban during chemo, her scalp bare
and cool beneath its silky furrows, no wig
to horde the Gulf’s close heat. Except
for the trail of oxygen tubes, the wheeled canister
beside her in the dresser mirror’s muted light,
she might have been a Vanderbilt on holiday
all those years ago. Or Nonnie Dougherty rising
out of memory perfectly coifed and hatted, Nonnie
Dougherty rising for communion, the sheen
of her wool suit, her perfect pumps
on the first Sunday of Advent, St. John of the Cross,
1959. Valerie missed the shapes of hats. A felt cloche
her mother wore in 1924, its deep bell-shaped
crown, the brim’s sassy arc, tipped down
to the iris of her right eye. A seagreen satin pillbox
she coveted once in the window at Lichtenstein’s,
netted veil stippled with tiny puffs of green,
blue roses in outline stitched into the weave
beneath. And yes, the flat-crowned, wide-brimmed
extravagance Madeline bought that day and wore
to sunrise service, Easter Sunday, 1960,
its white straw dappled with silk pansies,
and thick beneath, her hair, like burnished light.
