poetic divorce

i had not known that even
famous poets divorce,
but they do.
i was thinking how

billy collins
must have felt when
it happened to him

and how louise gluck
must have felt

when it finally truly ended

poetic divorce,

i thought,

is different from regular divorce

because in poetic divorce

you are being torn asunder
flayed alive

and spoons become forks

and mythical greek children write
about their parents' failures.

you force yourself to

keep on breathing in and out;

each day you wake up quickly
so that you can hurry the earth around
itself faster than usual, faster than usual
around the sun, bringing each day
to a premature close, maybe you can get

a little closer to healing with the
scurrying days and interminable nights.

there is an agony of change occurring
as the shadows rise and fall and seasons
come and go. it will take a while

for the new parts to knit

together well enough to be
able to go out in public

and not have people whisper and stare.

when dr. frankenstein's innocent monster

came to life he scared others.
they could not see the tender heart
that lay below the sutured skin.

that is how poets feel when

they look in the mirror and they

are going through a divorce:

no one else can see, but
looking back at them from the glass

is a certain kind of scariness with

a broken heart.

regular divorce is bad

whereas poetic divorce
cannot be explained with
words.