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Leaving the Okay Marriage

           Wreckage, thy name is progress. —Stephen Dunn

Chair with one shorter leg left at the dump. The apartment 
close date keeps shifting. No amount of packing tape          
will hold. I wake up on the black and white floor
of the restaurant bathroom as my cousin bangs on the door.
I try to wipe up the puke. I learn to sharpen my own knives.
Blue balloon drifting over trees, cut string still clenched.
Sitting on his lap, crying, I feel him getting hard. I don’t know
what to do with my hands. Chewed for a long time, 
kale turns sweet. He strips off his sweaty gym clothes. I turn         
away but not before noticing he looks more cut. Attention span     
of a firefly. I leave town for a week and forget my chargers.
He overnights them with a note: Recharge yourself. I love you.
Who really needs to wash their face every day?
Shiny dime left on the ground because it’s face down.

by Marie-Elizabeth Mali

Marie-Elizabeth Mali is the author of Steady, My Gaze (Tebot Bach, 2011) and co-editor with Annie Finch of the anthology, Villanelles (Everyman's Library Pocket Poets, 2012). She formerly co-curated louderARTS: the Reading Series and the Page Meets Stage reading series, both in New York City. Her work has appeared in Calyx, Poet Lore, and RATTLE, among others. She can be found online at www.memali.com. 
ISSN 2157-8079
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