Probs the Final Divorce Poems

In the past several weeks I feel like I’ve reached some kind of divorce closure milestone. It’s been driven, I think, by a combination of passing the year mark of when we decided to separate; the death of my cat Luna, who I got pre-marriage when I was much younger; and accepting the fact that I like someone new (and no longer spending time trying to talk myself out of that fact). In their own way — and combined — those three things made me feel the passage of time, and appreciate that getting older also means lots of learning and growing, if you let it (and giving far fewer fucks, generally).

Many of the poems that I’ve written in the past year have been very much about or related to le divorce. As I went through this transition to closure, several final pieces came out, and I’m pretty sure they represent the last of what I’ll write on it. I’m not saying I won’t ever touch on it directly or indirectly in new stuff that I write. I just don’t think it will be a driving force for me emotionally or spiritually the way it has been in the past 13 months.

The last cycle of poems I wrote were half done in Nicaragua and half done in DC right before and right after that trip. The Nicaragua pieces were not at all about the divorce, and they are some of my favorite things I’ve written in the past year or so. The poems that I wrote in DC were almost exclusively about the divorce, which makes sense since I was naturally thinking back to what was going a year ago in DC. Recap: my life was in a final stage of kinda falling apart, but ultimately I let it happen in a way that would let me rebuild in a much saner and happier way. Actually, I’m building and living it in a way that is much more in-line with how I was living or planned to live pre-Trevor. There’s a lot here for me to think through, which I’m guessing I will via future writing.

Anyway, here are two of the final divorce pieces. Good riddance, and all that jazz.

Lost in the Redwoods

Four time zones collapsed when
the thin orange line that held
us steady and close finally broke into
threes.

I tumbled down those winding roads
as I raced to the city, running to your
voice so clear in my head.

The blind curves on the way down
made me hold my breath.
I sliced through the seatbelts
of every SUV I passed,
daring them to outrun me, wanting
their drivers to shatter.

I called you from my mind’s outer limits,
but the message I got
said you had never been there.

Never, you.

April 30, 2019

Closed Tight

The shade is not as bad as the shadow,
once you realize you can rewrite a story
you sold to yourself
before you knew how much it would cost.

You listen to “Wuthering Heights”
for the 731st time and it no longer cuts you;
it doesn’t even feel like a strong gust of wind.

Just words in the air,
falling into ears
that no longer care.

April 30, 2019

Also, I’m about to take the MotherShip to Ireland, so pray for me. She will be totally offended when she reads that I said that, but she also has to be nice to me otherwise I’ll leave her in Dublin.

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