June

Born into favor
Mile high, nineteen-twenties
Wealthy, healthy, happy baby girl
All that they gave her
In the blood, invisible
Shriveled her as mother's little pearl

Isn't June supposed to be the time
When everything is in its prime
When all is green and glory?
Couldn't things have gone another way
Have feebler minds not been taught to say
That each life is a story?

Fashion-starved woman
Pre-war style in '75
Truly she was starved of so much more
Nobody's coming
Any time up to see her
Two zoo-keepers nailing shut her door

Isn't June supposed to be the time
When everything is in its prime
When all is green and glory?
Couldn't things have gone another way
Have feebler minds not been taught to pray
That their life tells a story?

If she'd caught a glimpse of her world after 1945
She may have known the phrase
"I could have been a contender"

Never having one male suitor bursting up her drive
Made sure her final days
Would be her sweetest surrender

Finally, her flesh
Joined her spirit, nineteen-eighties
One sad lonely wasted life
Anybody's guess
Is good as mine how so many
Spectators looked on like their hands were tied

Isn't June supposed to be the time
When everything is in its prime
When all is green and glory?
Couldn't things have gone another way
Have feebler minds not been taught to say
That each life is a story?