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A Talk With My Ex



I called you this morning

we spoke of many things.



Your Children.

Your fear of rattlesnakes.

Life in the high desert.



Foxes, Mountain Lions and Coyotes.

How when we first saw Leonard Cohen

he was about the age we are now.



We are almost 50,

and Leonard, well,

has become an old man.



How the very first cat we got had

died at the ripe old age of 21.

A breast cancer scare you'd just had.



I called her this morning

we didn’t speak of many things.



Talking with her is a bit like throwing a stray

ember back into the fire with bare fingers.

That usually works out OK.



Sometimes, well, you get burned.

Talk of her children kills me -

her abortion, our abortion, still pains me.



The strange love/hate/fear relationship

she has with nature never

did sit well with me.



Her need to constantly reinforce

how long we've known each other,

as if I couldn't do the math.



Our cat's death reminding me of

how very young and hopeful we

were for each other, and generally.



Reminded too, of her breasts,

and of feelings forever lost.

Her breasts, at least, remain unscarred.

Your poem's double-angled POV works really well (for me) Jon;
each half dependent on the other for clarity. Thank you.

I agree, I really liked the point of view shift - very effective.

I enjoyed this piece, thank you for posting it.

Cate

Thanks for reading it and also for you comments.

The comma is definately needed Violet.

It was kind of fun to write - the first part of course was the actual call, the second an unspoken
dialogue. I think, at least in my case, there are always unspoken layers to a conversation one has
with someone who was once central to one's life. She and I spoke about that yesterday and feels the same way to her.

Oh- my ex read the poem and liked it.