My wife cannot reach the top
of the stairs without stopping
for breath. She is thirty-eight
and looking bluer these days—
around the eyes, but also
in other ways. She touches
the place just below her breasts,
says she doesn’t feel a thing,
then brings my fingers to trace
the hollow spot that once held
our children, maybe so I
can remember her body
before the starving. Outside
a school bus squeals to a stop.
She presses her hand on mine,
blood still beating inside her.
Published in Cider Press Review, Volume 21, Issue 3.
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