Stop the press;
The papers sold my wife’s death.
Breadth taken from the back of news trucks
I watch a Crier boy as his finger tucks
Quarters into his loafers
Somewhere at a desk: A clerk with carpel-bound hands
Pushed her out for proof in Sans
I have her life wrapped up by the remote
And can read her life in a footnote
the urbanites bought the last piece;
an arm, a leg, recited by news writers— stories beatniks penned for the deceased,
then forgot forever
It’s in those words, the blanks I see; the void between the type, of papery colorless abandon
That haunts my dreams as the sawdust paper mills worked to dampen
A life.
Not the honeysuckle perfume she wore; dressed in black for Sunday Church, the dirges she sung
Or birthdays in the wide parlor and songs ripped from her joy-spurning voice; sweet harmonic lung.
It was in Times New Roman that I knew my love best;
Was not long before she only laid on her breast
So she would not disturb me with her rapidly beating chest
Between two men; you chose
a rich man; a man who appreciated a beautiful rose
Always you wrestle inside me;
In my son who grows big you see
Who couldn’t remember your maiden voyage; had only old photographs—ersatz-flavored recall.
Pictures when we were cats and had cat-calls.
I remember you;
In requiem—for a nickel trapped between two men;
In the obituaries.
