The View from My Bed

Yesterday I woke alone to another cold
day where she had already left
the bed and I had to eat breakfast
alone before I pulled my ski cap
tight over my ears and drove through
a sunlight that wouldn’t warm
and I lived my day as always:
reading, then thinking, then overpaying
for a lunch that I could not eat

I dislike the word “rage” but I know
that when rage grows as hot as our love,
like this, I drag the mattress from
the bedframe, pull it down the stairs
and throw it onto the living room floor
where she waits, sitting on a couch,
and I curse her for things neither
of us control and then I’m on the floor
sobbing but she stands, then sits,
with her hands over her dark eyes
and tells me when I leave I can take
the mattress, too, if I want it, but it’s not
about the mattress—it’s more about
how she waits for me to regret everything

Like when we sat at the close end
of the runway and watched
the single prop plane take off
away from us, and then the car,
silver and solid, pulled onto the field
and sped down the runway itself
at a stupid speed until it
flipped over at the far end,
just far enough that we
could see dust and the debris
rolling off of it, getting thrown
far over the trees, but we
could not see the car itself
and whether it existed as a whole
or just the pieces it had
birthed—it was a such a confusing
view for a boy and the Homecoming
Queen everyone remembers her as

And she says that just because you can’t
always see when something
breaks apart doesn’t mean it hasn’t
and she points to the fragments
shredding the leaves