Husband Fair, for Matthew.
How good to lay with my husband in our stone flat
Though there are not enough windows and too many doors
We need another chair
Smaller tables wobble too much for books
and won't hold both of our plates
But we eat, he and I
And the fare is good
I cook simply because he doesn't know how
Never learned, I don't mind
The food is mine too
He cooks, and we laugh
How good to tell him no when I feel like it
And yes, and maybe
And we laugh more
So freeing, he and I
So freely, though not carefree
There are bill collectors that threaten
And the roof over our heads, over our small bed
was not one we owned
We owned so little, but we get by
We go from here to there to here on need
And on whim, for desire, for work
How different from my line
From that woman, not so distant
Who never went anywhere beyond a field of cotton balls
Who lay with another's husband, my grandfather,
not so many fathers ago
He who owned so very much
And her pinned beneath him
His arms of rope, his body of winter,
who laughed only when she cried
His face, a heavy drift over hers
Her face, brown as the Earth below
Brown as my own.
And--