Splitting Up the Books
Pudding Magazine #60

When the marriage is over,
no one wants Jane Austen.

Happy endings taped up
in a cardboard box

to be given away
to others, sight unseen.

When a marriage is over
the poetry books are cold

leftovers, no one wants to claim
as read or to be read

on summer bed sheets.
O love, be fed with apples while you may.

When a marriage is over
it seems frivolous to fight

over comic books. Small
paneled stories of right

and wrong, with easy villains.
Even the good guys wear masks.

When a marriage is over
no one wants the science fiction

futures so dazzling
with probable improbabilities

it is embarrassing
how much you wanted to believe.