"To Speke of Wo that Is in Mariage"   

   
by A. E. Stallings

 A. E. Stallings reads 

"To Speke of Wo that Is in Mariage"



in RealAudio format.
     

   
"It is a choreography as neat
As two folding up a laundered sheet,
The way we dance around what we would say:
Approach, meet, touch, then slowly back away.

To sweep is to know what gathers there,
Beneath the bed: sloughed cells, lost strands of hair.
To wash clothes well is to take certain pains:
The sad and sordid stories of the stains.

Although my anger may be slow to boil,
I have the smoking point of olive oil.
Every time I wield a knife, I cry.
He has become the onion of my eye.

I dwell upon, it's true. He will not linger.
When I grow cold, the ring slips from my finger."

      Able Muse

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