Gifts and Shards Vol 1

Books of Judgement

I can't recall the moment the day, the month
you began your serious bookkeeping.

It wasn't at the moments of my worst offences,
both occurring in the first year,
neither repeated.

It was later -

but I remember the chasming of deep dismay
that my love could judge me this way:
cold, comprehensive, uneqiovocal;
yet selective, biased, unfair,

holding the book over me
ready to throw;
yet on my apology, on my backing down

your smiles returning, mode reset,
suddenly ready for all the glittering oxytocin
I would release in you,
the 'I love you so' and my name repeated
in ecstasy switched back on.

But the off switch was used more often;
off - off - off - again and again,
always altering the balance of power;

and often you were moody and needy
over missing your children
or thinking of your dead mother,
the Masters work piled on you:
always the C show;
and I gave support and back massages -
always the oxytocin - not enough.

From then on, through any misdemeanor
the books simply got bigger,
the threat greater;
until one day they reached critical mass
and had to be deployed.

Yet the strange thing is,
there were no really traumatic arguments in this period
(not till I slammed your car door on dead-mum's birthday),
instead,
like points on a driving licence
aggregates were stored against me.

On reflection, that was when the magic ended,
back there on your first
building and keeping of the books:
true love and such tribunals
simply don't go together.