After dinner she strolled down the street with her man arm in arm.
How to mark this celebratory occasion for a newly forty marm?

Oh, what about a tattoo?
That’s what she should do.

Fast Freddie’s was on the next block.
Walking in was, well, quite a shock.

It didn’t look too sanitary, not very clean,
but, “be brave, carry on – you’re not a queen!”

Looking through books of designs and letters
she felt her courage starting to fetter.

She wants a heart – tiny and red and demure
created with minimal pain to endure.

All the hearts are shrouded in barbed wire
so she figures the situation is getting quite dire.

She cannot do it, acquiring something so permanent.
She will go with an ephemeral tattoo, just semipermanent.