Says ‘I love you’
On the record
She repeats the verse
And strokes her hair
She should cut it
George the Cat surveys her
Wondering why she’s at home
On a Sunday afternoon
When she’d normally be
Getting brunch
With Ted
Ted is gone, George
She says
Ted is gone
Somehow telling George
Is harder
Than telling her mother
He left her for a girl
For shorter hair
She replays the record
She strokes her hair
She should cut it
Ted is gone
George doesn’t seem all that devastated
Confirming her suspicions
That he never really liked Ted in the first place
You should have warned me, George
But George believes in letting people
Make their own mistakes
Many mistakes have been made
Over the past twenty-four hours
The sink is backed up
Because she shoved a photo of Ted
Down the drain
She wanted it to go through pipes
And muck
And be wet
And irretrievable
Burning it seemed too…
…Romantic
Now the sink was clogged
And when she turned on the water
It came up from the drain
Rather than from the tap
Which was very unusual
Little shreds of humanity
Starting bubbling up
In the sink
Amongst the dirty plates
And floating forks
A nose
An ear
A hand on a shoulder
She ran to get the plunger
But it was stuck to a hole
In the bathroom wall
(A long story for another day)
When she ran back into the kitchen
The water was already pouring over the sink
Onto the floor
She grabbed a pot from the cupboard
And tried scooping it up
And running it to the bathtub
But after one lap
She was already fighting a losing battle
The water was up to her knees
And then her waist
George went floating by her
On a couch cushion
And she could swear
That he had a pair of scuba goggles on
That was the last thing she saw
Before she submerged
. . . . .
Under the water
There were fish
With long, gorgeous
Rugby player legs
And arms with biceps
And dorky glasses
And expensive haircuts
It occurred to her
That perhaps they weren’t fish at all
But men disguised
In scales and gills
They cleaned her plates
And washed her floors
And they asked her if she’d like to dance
And she said, ‘Yes, I’d like that very much’
And so she swam into her bedroom
And put on a blue dress
And came back into the living room
Where George was playing acoustic guitar
And she danced with the fish
And the men
And even with George
Once or twice
And by her head
The photo of Ted reassembled
And quietly removed itself
From the apartment
Which was all she really wanted
From the beginning
No comments:
Post a Comment