Scene:
3 A.M.
The Husband and The Wife lie in bed,
asleep.
The punch line:
3:02 A.M.
The Wife, stubbornly inert,
had not yet shut her eyes.
She is practicing the art of stillness
in the midst of a bloodbath
3:05 A.M.
soon to be brought about by her own wretched hands.
Above the sheets, she grips
the mirrored blade she stole from Williams-Sonoma
at 12:12 P.M., yesterday.
The husband breathes,
3:15 A.M.
bathed in sick, sick ignorance, but,
as the wife knows in all 206 of her bones,
not a drop of innocence.
She does not concern herself with the (During: 3: 51 A.M.)
****** itself,
even as her weapon slides cleanly between the goal-posts,
because she is already four steps past this act,
4:15 A.M.
scrubbing herself down with lye
and transferring the stained dish-rags from Wash to Dry.
The Morning After:
doesn’t really matter, it is all a performance
directed by necessity.
The wife stands at her kiln
(what a strange and extravagant wedding gift)
8:00 A.M.
and convinces herself that innocence
is a four-letter word, used exclusively by lying
men like The Husband--
who speak only in threats and backhanded
compliments.
In their fatal blindness, these men lie down in bed--
so very stupidly--
with the targets of their rage, the twisted products
of fear and resentment and bone-cold courage.
And The Husband stands tall with his cruelty--
Even at the moment of death (4:00 A.M.)
Even in the wake of his own burning flesh (8:01 A.M.).
Jul 6, 2017
Jul 6, 2017 at 9:16 AM UTC
Scene:
3 A.M.
The Husband and The Wife lie in bed,
asleep.
The punch line:
3:02 A.M.
The Wife, stubbornly inert,
had not yet shut her eyes.
She is practicing the art of stillness
in the midst of a bloodbath
3:05 A.M.
soon to be brought about by her own wretched hands.
Above the sheets, she grips
the mirrored blade she stole from Williams-Sonoma
at 12:12 P.M., yesterday.
The husband breathes,
3:15 A.M.
bathed in sick, sick ignorance, but,
as the wife knows in all 206 of her bones,
not a drop of innocence.
She does not concern herself with the (During: 3: 51 A.M.)
****** itself,
even as her weapon slides cleanly between the goal-posts,
because she is already four steps past this act,
4:15 A.M.
scrubbing herself down with lye
and transferring the stained dish-rags from Wash to Dry.
The Morning After:
doesn’t really matter, it is all a performance
directed by necessity.
The wife stands at her kiln
(what a strange and extravagant wedding gift)
8:00 A.M.
and convinces herself that innocence
is a four-letter word, used exclusively by lying
men like The Husband--
who speak only in threats and backhanded
compliments.
In their fatal blindness, these men lie down in bed--
so very stupidly--
with the targets of their rage, the twisted products
of fear and resentment and bone-cold courage.
And The Husband stands tall with his cruelty--
Even at the moment of death (4:00 A.M.)
Even in the wake of his own burning flesh (8:01 A.M.).
