you were pulling up weeds every chance you got. one by one, you carefully pulled each flower up by its roots and layed them to rest in a pile. i remembered when we were children mom would give us a penny for each dandelion we could pull, and we believed we might get rich off of this death because every day there were always more.
when you found me watching one day, when you paused to look up and your solitary moment was gone, you told me this story about a humming bird. the humming bird never perches, you said, she will fly continuously until she dies, and she easily does. but this humming bird, your bird, did perch. she landed on a flower before you and turned her head and looked you in the eye. and then she left you. you said once she was gone you started to remember that there was a time you loved being alive.
i asked you, what about now? but you ignored me and kept on pulling.
i wanted to say there was a time i dreaded going home because of you, because i knew one day you would die. because i knew we spent our evenings awake contemplating the moment we would no longer have all of this. all of this? you would ask me. but you knew what i meant.
while you were comforted by your task of pulling weeds, i was comforted by my bats. i would retreat into the field by our house at night, yes, this is where i went when you worried i was out at the bar, out with the boys. all of those nights you could not sleep thinking i might not return, i was throwing rocks into the night sky to watch the bats dive blindly towards them. did you know i did this for hours, because i knew i would not sleep under the same roof as you, knowing you were heavy with fear.
because i occupy a different space and time, it is easy for me to say what i would do if i were you, right? that i would cut the cancer out of me. but it is hard for me to imagine taking care of you while you die. you’ve given me everything i’ve made of my life. and what else do you want? besides who your children are, who are paid a little more to do lesser things than put their hands in the dirt. are we not enough to let you go in peace?
and when your bird flew away that day, why is it that you stopped talking with me? why is it that once i became a woman you could not throw a ball for me to catch or ask me what i wanted any more. when we talk now you tell me certain things, how you watched a basketball game or had dinner with the neighbor. how you kill the weeds now with poison instead of your hands.
