From this Bed
Allison Collins
“Woman Lying on Bed” by Pauline Zenk
In the aftermath, her edges feel blurred,
messier, even, than the mangled bedsheets.
She is shackled by the lassitude
of not knowing how to feel,
and the air hangs fat with the fact of what they’ve done,
the echoes of shared sighs.
So long, she thought she wanted this.
Much later, she will slice soft peaches for her children
and think only of yielding flesh
under the pad of her thumb, the cap of her knee.
She can’t bear the bowl his head has left in the pillow.
For the rest of the day, once she rises from this bed,
if she rises from this bed,
she will smell him, still,
on her face.
Allison Collins is editor of Upstate Life Magazine and a writer with The Daily Star and Kaatskill Life Magazine. Her work has been published in online journals and New Contexts 2: An International Collection of New Poetry & Prose. Allison lives in upstate New York with her family.
