On Marriage in a Rented House

(Remembering Marriage in a Rented House by D. Nurkse)

Part of One Year a Wife

And it was six months in that I realized that I screamed just like my mother.

In the smell of well-earned sweat and hot earth and stale cardboard that became us as we both of us returned to our small home, slowly swallowed on all sides by the pecan tree and dead tall-pines and the squash vines rolling through the alley and the oyster shells that rose up through the thin dirt in the yard when it rained.

And the little cat would only come out sometimes, when the dog was half asleep, or when you were barely stirring—still and seeing anything but me. And I knew that I was not being fair. My Love, I know that you ache for home so much like me. We grieve so different.

Wading through the paper bags and socks and wadded blankets and snowdrifts of slate-grey spring shed rolled across the deep-worn floors,
                the cluttered counter,
                                soap across the bathtub rim,
I’d come to fear what kind of woman I’d become.

               And you—
so very gloriously, beautifully, tenderly A Husband,

               And I—
A Wife.