What’s Leftover
At the house, remember we ate an omelet out of a single bowl.
I said elope, you said elope. What we really meant was I promise. If we see
each other now we keep our hands to ourselves. I can’t touch
the skin on your back or neck. New rules are new rules. A year is a year
is a year. Spacetime continuum aside, I still want to go to Nova Scotia
like we said. That red house, that blue sea. Use
a lighthouse like a lighthouse, all that spinning. I am learning
about the kind of promise you make when you’re just in the business
of making promises. In Marcy Village, the June heat, fan on a hum.
You fixing me vegetable soup and watching spoon for spoon
to see if I was pleased. I was. There was no soap in your bathroom.
I only saw my own desire, the shape of a bird circling.
One learns to separate fact from fact. When I talk about you,
I summarize. Maybe I say your name, my name, the Pope’s name,
pick a name, any name. The name of the ride at the State Fair
accidentally teaching kids science. Isn’t Gravitron such a joke?
So it’s easy: we were in a giant centrifuge. Now we’re not.
The kids are staggering out, dizzy. Stomach-sick, holding their babyguts.
Where are they headed? Asking about half-melted milkshakes, cotton candy.
This piece was originally published in the Madison Review and has been reprinted here with permission of the author.
Julie Henson lives in Lafayette, Indiana with her cat Pippa. Her work has appeared or is forthcoming in Southern Indiana Review, Iowa Review, Rattle, The Pinch, Yemassee, dislocate, Moon City Review, and others. She was a finalist for the 2014 Iowa Review Award in poetry and a semi-finalist in Boston Review’s 2014 “Discovery” poetry contest. Currently, she is co-poetry editor for Sycamore Review.
