Nancy Kricorian: Letter to James

This morning after you left

I slept until the phone rang,

and I let it ring. Then

the woman upstairs threw water

down the fire escape, which set

the pigeons off. I was hoping

a few of them got clean.

Sleep again, and dreams that

our house was besieged by starving

cats. I set bowls outside both

doors, filled with heavy cream.

My mother hung over the house

like a great bat, that kind

of shadow, that kind of fear.

But when finally I couldn’t sleep

any more, I had some cereal like

we do each morning, and thought

it sounded funny, one bowl and one

spoon. Some mornings the spoon

against your teeth bugs me, but

living with someone is like that.

Originally published in The Mississippi Review, Spring 1991