It’s how you sit 
in the middle 
of everything, waiting 
for the Woolf in me. 

I used to think 
of love as a reduction 
of self. How the act 
of loving diminished. 
An always setting sun. 
I think of how you are there,
open and waiting. And 
ultimately empty.
If only. 		
                 Two women set out on an
adventure. A hand gently rests. They
sneak gin from a tarnished flask. It
will matter more to the one in robin’s egg
blue. The other will know all of the right
flowers to arrange at dinner.

In blue.
                        She will say, But I did 
love you once
and your fingers 
of silk. Your cheek 
so cold. 

If hours. 
                    Ended and nothing stopped
the way you are the edge of glass. Sand
and fire and storm.      
 

Jen Rouse is a poet and playwright. She directs the Center for Teaching and Learning at Cornell College. Her work has appeared in The Citron Review, Pithead Chapel, Cleaver, Always Crashing, Mississippi Review, and elsewhere. Her books with Headmistress Press include: Acid and Tender, CAKE, and Riding with Anne Sexton. Find her on Twitter @jrouse.