I pity the woman who will love you<br />when I am done. She will show up<br />to your first date with a dustpan<br />and broom, ready to pick up all the pieces<br />I left you in. She will hear my name so often<br />it will begin to dig holes in her. That<br />is where doubt will grow. She will look<br />at your neck, your thin hips, your mouth, <br />wondering at the way I touched you.<br />She will make you all the promises I did <br />and some I never could. She will hear only <br />the terrible stories. How I drank. How I lied. <br />She will wonder (as I have) how someone<br />as wonderful as you could love a monster <br />like the woman who came before her. Still, <br />she will compete with my ghost. <br />She will understand why you do not look <br />in the back of closets. Why you are afraid <br />of what’s under the bed. She will know<br />every corner of you is haunted <br />by me.