Scylla & Charybdis

That longing, loving way he looks at his wife

and tells himself he can make betrayal work

the way they once made eight bucks an hour

and a rusty Hyundai work transforms her

into two monstrous problems, how to leave

while staying and vice versa. If only he could keep

the inside from the outside like a schooner

slapping waves, his heart afloat on the magnitude

of how she’ll seem the moment he lacks her

draining him, any memory a hole

even ahead of time. That’s the standard line,

a theory he finds repellent, kicks around like a dog

because he can, mad at himself for how

he treats her and blaming her for it. He’d jump

off a mountain, rob God at gunpoint

instead of hurt her. Clearly he’d rather lie than die,

which requires a map, negotiation as in rocks

to which one doesn’t speak. Today is what he does

with between, the agony of choice like two poles

he carries with him, the south and other south

of one far-flung chance, yes or now, no or ever.