A Broken Song

It does not matter who I was.

I am a wife, I was told to be one

To be a virgin; refined,

Fit to be betrothed and trembling

like a shrunken brown moth.

A very brown moth and its broken song.

My secrets still lie under his pillow

They smell of sweet jasmine and sweat

and of ancient lust,

They sing like broken bits of red glass bangles

Orchestrated between moans and sighs

Of a wet summer day.

Oh husband, how you look,

like an imbecile bull snoring on the disheveled bed

the night’s memories trapped in stained sheets

and entangled legs

I am a wife, I was told to be one