When our marriage was bankrupt, jobless,
holding a sign for donations, when our marriage was
a paper plane ablaze, an oil spot, a two dollar bill,
when our marriage was a two and six off suit, a house of cards
above the fault line, sheets folded in the spare bedroom,
when our marriage was an offset victory, frost on the apricot tree buds,
when our marriage was the blue screen of death, the bear market,
the autonomous vehicle, when our marriage was a horse
without a saddle or bit, a zebra with a lion on its back,
when our marriage was decaf coffee, club soda,
a candle without a wick, when our marriage was B.B. King
without the blues, Hendrix without a Stratocaster,
an electric guitar without pickups, when our marriage was a no vote
bill, autumn without the dead leaves, when our marriage was a torn ACL,
a swollen ankle without RICE (rest, ice, compression, and elevation),
braces in a toothless mouth,
when our marriage was a boxcar without graffiti, a lowrider
without hydraulics, a billboard without a DUI lawyer,
when our marriage was a ski resort with man-made snow,
the mafia without the dons, when our marriage was a corn maze,
skid marks, colorblind, when our marriage was diseased,
infected, septic, when our marriage was a mechanic without tools,
a sentence without punctuation, a playground without swings,
when our marriage was a failed space exploration
when our marriage was a pocket full
of pennies, a splintered handrail, when our marriage was
the fifteen minute paid lunch, a faded tattoo,
when our marriage was two sovereign states, an expired passport,
when our marriage was a sailboat without sails, a Ferrari
without red paint, when our marriage was gangster rap
without the gangster, the snowman on the first day of summer, when
our marriage wasn’t a lanyard, a floaty,
a MasterCard accepted everywhere,
when our marriage was an Esteem that won’t start,
a union on strike, when our marriage was
in beta mode, the concrete without the rocks, rudderless,
rehearsed, when out marriage was a composition of vacancy,
a pickpocket of selfishness, a deployment of sobriety,
when our marriage was snorkeling the hard candy dish,
the king of hearts, hypnotized by vanity, I was euphoric
knowing you would never watch me turn into a lure
without a hook, the axe with a broken wooden handle,
the lost and confused neighbor we watch circle the block
for hours, who steals our garbage cans,
but now, that shot in the arm is just a track mark.
Logan Seidl is a graduate of the University of Nevada, Reno. Recently, he has won the DQ Award in both fiction and poetry, and the James H. MacMillan Scholarship for poetry/fiction written about Nevada. His poetry has been published in Crack the Spine, Constellations, The Kentucky Review, Crab Creek Review and The Meadow.
Image by Hannah Jackson
Pine Hills Review 