by Ashley Kirkland
My husband tells me
my hair isn’t curly.
It’s wavy. Says I don’t
clean the house. I tidy.
Like I’m some
woodland creature
in a cartoon. What’s
weird is I clean
constantly, curls
swinging wildly down
my back. I wonder if
this isn’t the epitome
of marriage after a decade
(or flash, I can’t tell):
saying the same things
differently, like playing
Battleship. I’m tired
all the time and we
wonder why that might
be. I search “Symptoms
of Narcolepsy” and he
says “B12 deficiency?”
over text in the morning
from our desks across
town. Sometimes, I look
in the mirror in our foyer
at our life, framed painting
of our house, the children,
and I am so full of
all the things I was told
I needed when all
I want is to walk
over to the table, sit
down, write this poem.
Ashley Kirkland writes in Ohio where she lives with her husband and sons. Her work can be found in 805 Lit + Art, Cordella Press, Boats Against the Current, The Citron Review, Naugatuck River Review, among others. Her chapbook, BRUISED MOTHER, is available from Boats Against the Current. She is a poetry editor for 3Elements Literary Review.
January House Literary Journal 
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