My First Affair With That Older Woman

When I look back now At the abuse I took from her I feel shame that I was so innocent, But I must say She did match me drink for drink, And I realized that her life, her feelings for things Had been ruined along the way, And that I was no more than a temporary companion. She was ten years older and mortally hurt by the past and the present. She treated me badly: desertion, other men; She brought me immense pain, continually; She lied, stole; there was desertion, other men, Yet we had our moments, And our little soap opera ended with her in a coma in the hospital, And I sat at her bed for hours, talking to her, And then she opened her eyes and saw me: "I knew it would be you," she said, Then she closed her eyes. The next day she was dead. I drank alone for two years after that.