5:00 a.m. and I am waiting for the slap
of your feet on the kitchen linoleum.
A shuffle of papers while you look
for the sports page.
The cat door clicks into place
while the neighbor’s truck chokes
in the alley. I imagine you’ve fallen
in the bathroom, numb and silent,
thinking of me.
Or perhaps the basement door was left
unlocked—an intruder has shot you
and is now headed for the bedroom.
What would I do without you?
Never love again?
Lose ten pounds, cut my hair
and move to Vermont?
It seems I ask for these moments
of terror. The spiral into the possible
headline: Husband Found Dead
While Wife Sleeps.
Now the door opens softly, casting
its long shadow across the bed,
you move slowly so as not to wake me.
The grey robe rolls off your shoulders
as it has a thousand times before
and I see how this one motion
is proof; you are whole, here
by chance or choice.