before you (we/I was) were born

I think, for her it was easiest to hold in the fury, if she stayed in bed, turned on to her left side and faced the windows, faced the pond in back, the sunlight already present, on the edges of the window shutter flaps, softly painting her soft arms and gently pushing her shoulder — “wake up, woman,”.

She hated her husband. She hated his bossiness, aloofness, his attention to his shave, the way he locked the bathroom door, went in duplicitous, came out unashamed. She hated the sun.

If she rose, she made her bed — the goal of course, was an army bed, tight, soul-less, perfect. Have you thought about how many times you’ve arced around the perimeter of a mattress, how easy it can be to sideways sweep your dreams onto the floor, forgetting what you knew of life before you were born, the galaxy logic, the library within your cells before your journey to earth?

“Wake up woman,” said the sun with thousands of languages in its glint. “Wake up woman,” her rays laughed, cried, illuminated the pond out back, the leftover storms, the wash-overs, and shores reaching land’s edge and crumbling cliffs, the silence before now, the golden cracking darkness.

Wake up woman. Turn toward love’s glare, it makes you better at loving other people.