I Could Not Care Less About The Light Switch - NaPoWriMo Day Fifteen Prompt

intermediate, mediate, or whatever,
I do not need its technical portrait 
imprinted on my retinas.
As if you scored those wires on my eyelids
instead of crumpled fists of paper
our bedroom littered, yes, yes, our bedroom
where I am so desperate to be sleeping,
duvet to forehead, clawed over the ears,
this unbidden seminar of light switch electronics
threatening to blow a fuse in our marriage--
I DO NOT CARE!
I do not need to know why 
the switches won't match when the lights are out.
And we have tried every combination
every puzzle box of on and off
to make them fall in to a uniformed march. 
It was never a why question, but a general annoyance
of a thing seeming out of place,
like unmatched salt and pepper pots!
Not purposeful, but one being oh-so-slightly shorter?
Thinner? More rounded on the corners?
Not a, "this is salt, and this is pepper difference"
just difference you can't quite pin down
or turn off,
like the bloody light switches 
you won't stop explaining,
or drawing 
at two a.m. 
when I mistakenly say 
'I'm still not getting it?'
Which I admit was really my fault
so I'll take the next round of circuitry analysis in stride
but gods above, will someone smite me,
and while you're at it, 
hit the lights.  

With The Other Mums In The Park - NaPoWriMo Day One Prompt

discussing our bodies, like sharp beaked harpies
picking clean the carcass 
of what was once a woman we recognised in mirrors.
In the reflective surfaces of car doors, and shop windows
with a matching stride, strut, stance, shape. 
We all have new shapes we do not know how to fit
or dress,
so we press ourselves into old clothes and old ways,
pretend the chafing is our imagination
or temporary discomfort,
like the first run back, after a week on the beach
we are picking sand out of our hair
and baby vomit from our clothes. 
It is all fine we say, and it is all not,
the taste of carrion on our tongues like an iron bit
we gnash between our teeth
when anyone suggests we are not already beyond
anything we thought we could manage. 

---

I’ve veered away from the optional prompt with my Day One poem. I took the ‘body’ idea and ran with that, so I might have to circle back to writing a prose poem. I did have some debate about posting my NaPoWriMo responses online, as it means I can’t submit them to various journals who only accept entirely unpublished work, but since I’m currently wading through rejections from those journals I decided to go ahead and just post. I’m probably going to tweak and polish the day fifteen poem for the Ledbury Poetry Slam at the end of the month, and I’m really quite fond of my Day One poem. Thoughts and feedback are also welcome in the comments, so if you enjoyed either poem I would love to hear from you. Otherwise it can feel a little like shouting into the void.

“Hello void, how very nice to chat with you again. How’s the wife?”