soaking in the warm
           water, her large body
              covered in soap

and bubbles.
           she sipped a glass of champagne
              her toenails sat

sticking out
            like bright pink
                                                   icebergs.

her eyes closed
            and relaxed, she knew the children
               would not be home.

her husband was where he said
             he wasn’t and she knew
                    they were broken.

but she was calm.
                 like a desert
                                                     breeze.

she looked into her eyelids
            and saw work
                 waiting on Monday,

her son struggling with order
             of operations, her daughter
        knowing men better than her.


sinking in slowly,
               her chest warmed like a
       leather car seat in August

kissing the water it
            submerged her plump
                                                        fac­e

she gasped and sat up,
      rubbed the soap from her
                                                        eyes
­
and saw a
           ladder,
                  a golden ladder against

the back of the tub,
looking about the
   bathroom and saw nothing

but the ladder,
     which climbed up and into
       the ceiling

which was now a sky!
         a gleaming sky
           with sparse white clouds,

oh, what a scene!
                putting her hand out she
                  grasped the bottom rung,

her wet body half in water,
                      half out. She pulled hard
  on that rung, but barely moved

again, she thought about Monday,
           and the weight she couldn’t
                                                        ­    carry.

a day she would see her boss,
       her husband,
                                                        ­  herself.

she finished the champagne.

she let her fat body
                          
                         fall
                         into
                          the
                        water.

“Nearer my God to thee...,”
she sang into her wet eyelids
hoping angels can swim.


©David Moloney