Reader, I married him

A golden shovel after the song ‘Midnight Train to Georgia’ by Gladys Knight & The Pips

If you asked me why I made myself so small, I’d
show you the river; the one that would rather
gorge itself on sewage than be clean. I’d give you a toe to live
upon, a rotten tree to kneel before, a dustpan to curl up in,
a name pried from a ghost. My laughter was thin, but his
gave all the birds a breath to glide on. A foothold for the world.
I was never that attached to me anyway. Never more than
a ribbon’s stretch away from curling against a blade. I once put a live
wire on my tongue to taste the void. It was not without
its sweetness. That sleep – like choking on feathers, like him:
the place where women went to die. Fucking me in
front of the mirror, so I’d know the face beneath him was mine.

Isabelle Baafi