"Sylvia continually needed to find reasons not to kill herself rather than a reason to do so.”
– Helen Vendler

The ring on her left finger – still on.
She wants to swallow it,
have it rest in the pit of her stomach
and rot.
At least it would be gone.

But she has the children. She has a horse
galloping toward her in her dreams.
It wasn’t so long ago when she
rode that great mare out in Court Green.

But that was before this cold, cold winter,
before the flu and the pipe breakage.

Before the ridiculous high heels of the
black-haired siren that plodded
over her country garden.

Now she has tea to make, nappies
to wash; her list of things-to-do
is endless, never finished, never
fully crossed-off.

The only salvageable part of her day
lies in two moments:

pulling the blankets up tight around
her children’s necks

and those first blinks of morning,
when the time is all hers,
when she is neither wife nor mother

but slave to herself and, perhaps,

perhaps that is what will drive her down
in the end. And that end is what keeps her going.
Knowing there will be that end.

11/25/2004

Author's Note: part of the Sylvia series

Posted on 11/25/2004
Copyright © 2024 Lisa Marie Brodsky