4.
How was the cooking class? I asked my wife when we both got home. Dominique thinks I should open my own place, my wife said. After three classes? I asked. Eventually, she said, emphasizing each syllable. She looked at me like I had something on my face, but I knew that I didn’t.
5.
Later that night, I went to my shop and cleared a small corner of my sewing table. In this corner, I thought, I can be a poet before I’m a curtain maker.
6.
Since then, every night I sit myself down, because that’s the first step to anything worthwhile. I bark at myself from a dog place in my brain, a place only I can hear: Write! Then I get up and go to the kitchen to get some olives.
7.
The poem is about my wife, I think. The poem is about Sunday mornings, when the sun is too early. The poem is about being the last human being on earth, but responsible for someone else.
8.
Of course we still have sex, my wife says.
9.
The last time we had sex, it was cold out and they said a storm was coming. My wife was shivering in fear, making lists to steady herself. For a while I was trying to cross things off her list — candles, eight gallons of water, move things away from windows. Check, I would say cheerfully at her, check check check. But the more I crossed off, the longer the lists got, and the more anxious my wife seemed. She was sitting on our bed, her upper body low like it was trying to reach her knees. I stood close behind her, put my hands on her shoulders. Honey, I said, and she tilted her head back and looked up to meet my eyes. There was such fear in her face, and I hadn’t thought this through; Honey was all I had. I said Honey again, to buy a few seconds, and then I just saw it, saw in her eyes the thing she needed to hear, saw it the way you see anything — a car in the driveway, a coat in your closet. I promise you it’s going to be okay, I said; can you trust me? She let her head lean farther back until it touched my stomach, and I held her like that for a bit, then turned her around to face me, kissed her eyes. Her body softened, opened.
* * *
When the winds came later that night, they were far weaker than expected, and we were still inside each other. It had been a while since we made love like that — hearing our rhythms without effort, reaching toward each other without haste, again and again.
* * *
When we woke up the next day, the outside was yellow and brown, a strange mix of relief and disappointment. I tucked a curl behind my wife’s ear. We didn’t die, I said, and smiled. Don’t be dramatic, she said, and got out of bed. God, I need to brush my teeth, she murmured with her back to me, heading to the bathroom; I woke up with an awful taste in my mouth.
10.
I like saying my wife to strangers, seeing their eyebrows twitch. The eyebrows always twitch. The only difference is whether they let them twitch or try to keep them from twitching because they’re liberals. When they ask — smiling, to show they never twitched at all, why would they? — How long have you been married? I say, We were in the first weddings, Massachusetts. I nod a couple times and look away. If I let myself see their eyes, I will see the next question. And I admit: I want to leave them to their twitching.
11.
Someone, perhaps my wife, used the expression in conversation. The street was being loud right as these words left her lips — loud on the end, loud on the ation. In converse was what I heard. I can use this for my poem, I thought. That is how I operate these days, like a thief.
12.
Whenever my wife wanted to read the poem, I’d say It’s not ready it’s not ready. Sometimes she’d say Read it anyway, read to me while I cook. Then I’d say I prefer to finish it first, and my wife would make a face. I didn’t know why she felt this urgency with the poem. What I did know was: when it’s ready, I want her to listen without cooking. I’d say nothing though, because what’s the point?
13.
Last week in class we workshopped a poem written by an older woman with thick black hair. The teacher talked about mastering the quiet, which has something to do with space breaks. This woman is very good at space breaks, if I understand it correctly, and is quite close to mastering the quiet altogether.
* * *
After class, I collected my things slowly, waited for people to leave. The teacher was texting or perhaps checking his e-mail. I waited for him to make eye contact, and when he did, I asked How do I know when a poem is ready. The teacher sighed. A poem is ready when the poet stops writing it, he said. So I should just stop writing it? I asked, confused. The teacher put the phone in his back pocket. I said the poet, he said. He looked at me for a few seconds, then started moving toward the door. With his back half to me he said, Look, it’s not personal, I just don’t like it when students get ahead of themselves. Whatever poem you’re talking about — let’s workshop it first and take it from there.
* * *
I stood in the empty classroom for a long moment after he was gone.
14.
When I got home that night, I could hear laughter. I stood outside our door and listened. Why would Dominique be in our living room? But I was wrong — the laughter was coming from the kitchen. They were giggling at the salmon. My better half is home, my wife said when I opened the door, glancing in my direction. How am I better, I wanted to ask, in what way? I have an order to finish, I said and walked toward my shop. I’m sorry about the smell, my wife called after me; let me know if you need your pills. I’m allergic to fish, and sometimes the smell alone burns my lungs. It’s a big order, I shouted back, I just have to finish it. I sat myself down and tried to find the quiet in my poem, but everything was loud. I tried to find the quiet in my poem until through the loudness I heard Dominique leave.
* * *
In bed, my wife mentioned a cooking seminar in the south of France. I can learn so much over there that I can’t learn here, she said. I nodded in the dark. But there’s more to learn here too though, I said. There was nothing before my wife said, Sure. When I heard my wife sleeping, I said, I’m quitting the poetry class. That’s too bad, my wife said, already in a dream. It’ll get too soggy if you soak it overnight.
15.
I didn’t know the seminar was only a few days away, didn’t know my wife and I had agreed she should go. I only understood the next day, when she brought the big suitcase up from the basement. She looked at my face and said, You didn’t think I would take the small one, did you? It’s a long time! I said No, of course, of course. I wanted to ask how long exactly, but got the feeling I was supposed to know. I didn’t want to say anything that would make her think once again I wasn’t listening. It was true — I was lately finding it hard to listen.
* * *
My wife cooked for me that night. Do you like it, she kept asking, even though I said a few times that I did. She was saying things about the texture of the food, and I nodded. I wanted to ask if she would still have vacation days when she returned. I’d been wanting us to go somewhere, but she could never take time off. Now, from what I understood, she was using those accumulated days for the seminar. But perhaps not all of them, I thought. Perhaps she would still have a few left? If she’d resist, I would say something like If you can take time off for cooking, why not take time off for us? I was thinking it through while chewing. I had good ideas, but the words stayed in my mouth.