The Beauty of Marriage

The Beauty of Marriage
Elyse Brownell

People often ask if I feel different

now

I weigh my body on his scale

yes. I say. but only in crowds

Remember when you first turned

the age of your end point?

and someone once asked you

if you felt different?

it’s not like that at all

It's like this:

While standing in Arizona

I loved him in Utah

he loved like the first time in Colorado

There is a shift now

as if my organs lifted up,

traded spots, my heart now my liver

I drink it full

The list of exes doesn’t seem to matter

the skin between the gap

doesn’t seem to matter

I am only his to scale

(Don’t write me into

a feminist snarl)

it’s okay to love

it’s okay to give your body away

it’s okay to forget about the first person

you ever loved

There will always be other pebbles

to collect inside

some heavier than others

some weightless, like driftwood

left on another shore

and you will want to turn them over

find out what the other side was

rotate to see what may be exposed

and you will want to

fall asleep next to them

one more time

touch the fracture you each created

one more time

and you may still want to

skip them across the flattened pond

a rupture of the flat line

he left you on

but all that matters

is the weight of my husband 
on the other side

of the bed

mine to scale.

 *inspired by Anne Carson's "The Beauty of the Husband"