Her shoulders are dog-eared

but wide as Irish goodbyes,

she tries to leave me for good

only after promising she wouldn’t.

She’s got morning absence:

a hole in the mattress

deep as I’d dug it

during that argument about my father leaving me

            did that mean I would leave her?

She crawls back to the same hole.

Like a 7PM “goodnight,”

everything she says is moldy

her way of making me feel like a November pumpkin.

She expires on my side of the bed,

hoping I push her into her side

into the hole.

But we’ll sleep on my side

until it becomes a hole, too.

Sleep until there’s no longer a bed.

Then, sleep on the floor.

Christine Donat was born and raised in NY. She attended the State University of New York at New Paltz where she learned the many forms of creative writing. Christine pulls her inspiration from self-analysis and from conversations with the world.