love, bruxism, a basement

I’ve been making good use of 
my masseter muscles
in a room that was built for you.
You’re not here but I
think I wish you were.
The battery is dead 
in that clock you hated.
Once indifferent,
now I’m lonely 
without its tick.

I went out into the cold to cry
tonight but couldn’t.
The stars were bright and mocking me 
for thinking that I’m anything 
consequential at all.
The dog whined and stood with 
one paw lifted from the snow,
an idiot flamingo on the 
lawn of my childhood home.

I think about seeing you soon 
and a kind woman telling us what to do.
We’ll spend fifty-five minutes 
and two hundred dollars
to learn if love is enough.
I killed a spider in the shower yesterday
and felt brave for two seconds.
I paused before 
I washed him down the drain.
Maybe staying together is actually 
the most courageous choice we could make.

© Glennys Egan