Dear Eve,

the bathroom stinks
the dishes need washing
not a clean sock in the flat
dinner sits cold on the stove
you glare pits into my stomach.

******* do something about it.

My mind, a clogged drain
chokes on the insults
you hurl with an icy tongue.

I cannot look into your eyes
blue-grey full moons
drowned me at high tide
and my ***** drowned in you
a log swept into a storm drain.
The tide is out
not coming back
I stick out of the sand
just rotting driftwood now.

I know how to push things down
hide the stains
flecks of grimy sticky nuisance
nothing that won’t scrub away.

Clear the **** smell from the sink.
Do the dishes.
Recite the laundry sermon forwards then backwards.
Warm dinner...then hand wash my sackcloth,
polish my cilice to the luster of a halo,
knot my cattail,
do whatever it takes
to live through this inquisition.

Staring at your feet
follow them wherever they go.
Can’t talk to you.
Your voice is too loud.
So I take a shard
to my skin
inscribe the thousands of unsaid things
and become a book of blood
that you will never read.