After Pennsylvania, I couldn’t breathe.
—LUCIE BROCK-BROIDO
The facts are: I drove all night through the mountains to get away from him
I cut up my credit cards to prove I would not leave him
I woke up in the hospital
to bonesaw / brushfire / thralldom
the pieces were out of order there was glass in my cheek
I tried to swallow an entire bottle I tried to leave
without giving away my name I was not lost
I listed no forwarding address
There was a reason why I named the dog Valor
If I was silent I’d learned the virtue
of protecting my mouth at least
I was going home
to the house between the cemeteries
to the redbud the willow trees
the heavy muck-wet woods
I loved & in my absence
the house had been torn down
to make more space
for the dead
I stood there breathing
It felt like
sliding a hand through loose dirt looking
for tendrils & pockets of air
It’s easy to be angry
about how much hope there is
in reaching
The whole house gone
& so many little monuments
to the wrong thing
In the bare yard
all of my good trees
still framed the hole
where the house had been standing
In my new life whatever I claimed
I didn’t feel it was mine
How easily I could be a river dragged
a gray car raised up from the bottom dripping
Already I was on a string I could be lurched up
out of hiding & the evidence tagged
He took the money he said I made him crazy it was my fault
What was wrong with me how could I ever think
I could leave was I really so stupid he said
he would call the police
he set my furniture on fire he said
he would drive my dog to the pound if I went out
I’d like to say now that he was just a list of grievances
Who else would try so hard on someone so fucking worthless
is some kind of war proposal
that no longer works on me
What I want is a permanent figure
I want a marker here to separate
The Time Before from The Time Now
One ivied-over angel
for a woman with no known name & no known history
A monument for the disappearance of X
for the opening of a deep well in which I would tread water
for the blood to tide
for the trees to fall
for 100 years of winter