The snore that severed me from peaceful dreams
Was his zipper, ragged as the pull stroke of a chain saw.
Though the act was six thousand and many nights ago,
The sound still rips through me as I edge toward sleep.
The cruelest wedge he drove forced comfort from my bed,
Where I might have healed when the pounding stopped.
My duvet of down and sheets of Egyptian weave don’t soothe
The girl of twelve, sobbing, shattered, on her closet floor.
The graft never takes; split forever, my seam is open to the
world.
From dark to dawn, till I stand up, fully clothed,
I count the hundred saplings around her grave
And, weary, guard that little forest with my life.
