Measured Smiles

She smiles with lips that never quite agree, A courteous curve, sharp as thorns in tea. Her eyes, forever measuring the space Where love arrived wearing a younger face.

She guards her son like heirloom porcelain, Fearing new hands might leave a crack or stain. In whispered sighs and glances cold and thin, She draws the line of where she won’t let in.

The daughter-in-law stands patient, soft yet strong, Learning the rhythm of a borrowed song. She offers kindness, laid out bare and true, But finds it weighed and found to be “too new.”

Between them hangs a silence, old and tight, Woven of habit, pride, and misplaced right. One fears replacement, one just wants a place, Both loving him, yet missing each other’s face.

And time, that gentle thief of sharpened pain, May yet teach hearts what pride could not explain:

That love expands—it doesn’t disappear, And there is room for all when none hold fear.