Day Trip to Charlestown

You can drive all day

to reach the ocean, spend

several fragile moments wishing

she were always closer.

You might wish to be

a fisherman, fantasize

about tan and sinew, sea glass,

surf. The island at the horizon

beckons. But you have a station wagon,

not a schooner, and bills pile up.

Other mothers on the beach know.

You catch one’s eye as she tugs

her swimsuit top, all

the diffidence of motherhood

passing between you.

Only gulls are free here, only

children in photographs.

For Grace’s prompt to the Real Toads: JUDITH WRIGHT

Hematoma

My

ample

character

deficiency

wears a two-week bruise

badge of incompetence

brassier than wedding rings

fused with the pain of bloody years

in a crucible made of half-truths

masquerading as whole reality