One and Other

An old man knows
what youth was, and is,
but a girl with white teeth,
red lips and wet hair
can only guess about old age.

A brow may be seamed
like a stave, its music faint
but complicated, rich.
Or it may be a blank sheet,
a piece of fine linen, stretched tight.

A beard tells a story, it
signifies. It is a skein of days,
a combed book, time written
in strands of hair.