We get ducks in
for ragu like
the old days. He
cleaves on
through their bones. I am
once again in the
little room with shelves
pulling crumpled
junk and dross from the
corner behind
old bottles of merlot. He
likes to go through bone
to feel the knife
hit the spot of white like
a solid strike,
then knows the
dagger now requires
body weight, and so he
drives the heels of
both his hands
to move through with
unblunted edge. I am not
stuck to his skin the
dampness of my wants those
spiders that have crept back
into the wine room corners. I like to
leave them, to
leave something alive
in the aftermath of
divorce and pandemic, how
the whole world’s stop
is like a spouse’s quick decampment—
I am already
accustomed to
crack of duck neck,
how much the knot of hug
means two bodies never
pressed and wrapped again.