When My Husband Tells Me He Wants a Divorce

I am eating a waffle
He follows the wood grain on the table with his
trigger finger                I wonder if I should
direct my questions there                                 When

animals are hungry     they hunt and
moan               When they are hurting            they cower and
moan               When any need arises             they moan                   never

deceiving themselves on the road between
gut and throat              We just looked at a house
yesterday          I say                 Laughed
with our friends in this room

Next     we plead the regrettables: Is there someone else        This will
make your mother happy        What about our daughter      I don’t
want you         
                                      Don’t want you

I type   husband said he wants a divorce        into the search bar
The results instruct me not to beg                to look and be the best wife                no

sweatpants or lying in bed                  I find it difficult to fold our laundry
with a bomb strapped to my chest                  remote in his hand
tracing tracing the deep-seated grain              

Conversations like these don’t end                 they die
hungry             I go outside to scream             My moaning hits our home
and echoes back to me                          Do I cut the red wire or the blue         

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Cyndie Randall's poems have appeared or are forthcoming in Crab Creek Review, Love’s Executive Order, Whale Road Review, Boston Accent Lit, Okay Donkey, Yes Poetry, and elsewhere. She works as a therapist and plays among the Great Lakes.