Visiting Hours

This evening we are spared from another purply tie as Brian Williams knots up a familiar striper of midnight and white, the latter having the texture of grosgrain ribbon.  After so many weeks of being so very ill, her patience and good humour were brittle and nearly spent.  He came in with a small bouquet of tulips and a silly stuffed dog. She turned to him from gazing wistfully out the window, and her eyes were shiny and wet.  One blink, and they overflowed.  He held her and when the tears subsided, he picked up her hairbrush.  Scalp to ends, he brushed her dark tresses; it always took the stress away.  He tied it all up in a beautiful ribbon and, just to make her laugh, put one on her new dog, too.