Peeling potatoes,
I am changed.
Perhaps it is
my own skin
I peel away,
my own
eyes I cut out.
But I am changed.
For years I have
been thinking
you hold me back—
like two strays found together,
too anxious to adopt out
separately. I point at you
with my paw, as if I am not
quivering too. It's all him!
But that’s not
really us, is it?
No—just a
trick of my brain.
Perhaps there is too much
social media in my feed—
feed as in feedbag,
like for horses.
I was wishing for your death—
the one thing
I dread and do not want,
but also the inevitable.
Do all marriages go through
a phase like this?
We would not know.
This is the longest
either one of us
has been married.
A widow’s memoir,
grieving her husband
of forty years, says yes:
this is a normal
test of every marriage.
You know everything about
my first husband. I know
little about the four wives
before me. I know one
was a pillhead, and you
threatened to kill her
dealer if he sold to her again.
I know many got houses
in the divorce, and once
I wondered if I would
get a house
in the event of a divorce.
I won’t ever know.
But I will get the house
in the event of your death—
It's in both our names.
Even if you pay for it.
Yesterday, you said,
“Sorry about yesterday—
it wasn’t you. It was me.
I felt so inadequate.
Unworthy.”
I forget you can feel that way too.
I am well acquainted with inadequacy.
You know that same day
you felt inadequate,
you then talked about how good
of cooks your mom and aunt were—
everything from scratch, bacon hand-cut
from a pig raised in the backyard,
and how you’ll never taste food
that good again.
I thought, why would I try
to make another meal
with titans in the rearview mirror?
But now a new day has come,
and the staff show our kennel
to a prospective future and say,
“These two need adopted together—
she would be lost without him.”
To everyone outside,
it just looks like I made potato soup
from scratch,
and you said,
“Smells good, baby.”
Our future is bright
and together.
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