Third Marriage
by Jan Gracie Mulcahy
from All The Way Home
We are well worn gloves, shrunk
to father/daughter mellowness,
shabby, pre-loved,
garnering ghosts that share our separate beds,
where unfinished whispers and resentments
nibble at remnants of our intimacy.
Stale rituals, time bound to the news,
we eat meals as bombs devour human lives.
I used to care once, longed for a string quartet,
candles and a glass of wine, now candles
burn only in a blackout accompanied by silence
from the sullen television set.
On such nights, we fight over trifles
never say sorry, wait to forget.