The Stale Bread Keeps A Corner

• a Poem

The stale bread keeps a corner green fungus splattered on it, meaningless in its existence, makes bubbles floating towards a white sky look puny — the bread decorates my white counter the scent of the lemon-polish Martha had scoured in its marble pores, mixes with the stench of the white bread — but it is not like my marriage where we kiss passionately for a country club, and benumbed from the performance, the craft on the bed is mechanical, half in sleep, the other half looking at the ceiling, laughing bitterly at the bees that had droned around the man, now inside me — and so, the stale bread is better. It is still edible.

©M.D.B.

Inspired by Ruth L. Schwartz’s beautiful poem The Swan at Edgewater Park.