Conjugal Elegy
Pillows & ribbons harness barefoot friends,
haughty sisters & smiles; mothers watch, snoring.
Dirty Jeep, broken January; darkness steals my grief.
I cannot imagine something more fragile than marriage.
You held my hand.
We listened to the Callas arias on our porch.
You kept rewinding the love song back to the beginning
to the place where she saings, Certainly not today.
Leaf shadows tent walls. My tongue traces
tattoos & scars. Strange shirts
mingle in the dryer. Tangled sand, uncomfortable
legs, wasted days spent memorizing the body
I'd soon share. Bride, bridge, bridle: all signs said,
Don't wife her.
I have learned how to hollow beginnings,
rewind homes & wedding veils.
Your drool, the doorknob, clumsy knots.
Today the map is mortified.
In bed, polka dots, miscarriage.
Weather changes leaves, fragile-making.
(not even divorcing in the eyes of the law: dissolving)
I remember my sorrow at finding ants housed in my mother's peonies.
When we moved, the new residents tore out all her flower beds,
the strawberry patch & the treehouse. I drove you there to show you.
You held my hand.
Valerie Wetlaufer, "Conjugal Elegy" from Mysterious Acts by My People. Copyright © 2014 by Valerie Wetlaufer. Reprinted by permission of Sibling Rivalry Press.
Source:
Mysterious Acts by My People
(Sibling Rivalry Press, 2014)