the painting

The Painting When she left, it was late in the evening on the snow-covered path to the street her footprints were not visible On the road, there were too many footprints to recognize if any of them belonged to her years like layers of wood stacked up when I saw her in a painting by Paula Rega So many suffering women abused by men and their desire to be loved, causing them to fall into hardship They survived while I suckled on a nipple another woman, risking her future in the hope of love where there was none the endless poverty doing others' laundry hands red bloated a ring of promise, not kept, impossible to remove. these are the women who do not leave footprints in the snow Paula Rega gave them a voice, reduced the men who had lost what they thought was love, to fear ghosts in the longest night