By the time I enter the Stop and Shop,
people are standing immobile in the produce
aisles next to pyramided oranges.
Nothing is moving, not the asparagus placed
in water trays, lettuce recently misted,
except the paramedic who stoops over
a man on the floor lying on a stretcher.
The paramedic adjusts an oxygen mask over
the man’s face and then they move toward me.
My God, I think, that man’s hair is a mass
of gray curls just like my husband’s;
and as they pass, I see the body strapped down,
don’t know that windbreaker, that plaid shirt.
His pant legs crumple round his shins,
expose legs shiny, hairless, tanned,
they glow like the casings on bolognas.

When I return home, it’s early afternoon.
I leave the bags of food in the kitchen,
find my husband, take his hand, and lead
him to the fresh sheets. Later, I look down
into his eyes; they are closed, his forehead
furrowed. When we lie spent but still entwined,
his arm rests heavy across my breast,
and I think of the strawberries I left on the counter,
the first of the season that promises so much.