It was cold out.
She was bloodletting herself.
It had been a slow day.
January twentieth, two-thousand:
upstairs, a girl.
Twenty-five years of age.
She is crying into her pink bubblebath.
She is thinking.
She remembers things:
her young husband,
and these last five loveless years.
He had loved her once.
From somewhere far away,
she knew that he still did.
But it was different now.
Everything had changed.
Everything
(does)
Dowstairs is his picture.
On the mantelpiece, next to some things they had picked up
in Germany, so long ago now.
On the frame:
“My darling Billy, I love you so.
March 3rd, 1974 – January 20th, 1995
We will meet again.”
The coroner is leaving.
She was pronounced dead
shortly after six.
30 september 2000
11pm