Before she could walk she did the twist 

for us, her big sisters. Hooked her plump 

fingers over the crib rail and bounced 

like a beach ball in her white onesie. 

“What’s your name, baby?” “Bebby,” she’d say. 

“Last hired, first fired,” I say. To myself. 

Because it’s no joke for me to crack

decades later in her hospice room,

not even if she could laugh without

drowning in her cage of slosh and bone. 

Daddy’s sleeping, Mama’s not around 

and I haven’t learned how to be old.

Just older. My shadow angles long.

All the chairs and tables are so small.