last night i was single because i had suffered the devastating loss of my husband to a bus accident. i was crying a lot. i sat out in the backyard, on the muddy ground, with my back resting against the deck and the wake was going on around me. people were milling everywhere but nobody was really talking to me. i think i had rejected everyone. my neighbour came up to me and said he was also mourning because his wife had died that morning. we cried and cried. our children were crying. we were in no state to comfort them. other people had to do it.

someone handed me the phone, and it was steve burns. he said he couldn't talk long but that he was very sorry for my loss and that he thought it would be a good idea for me to take a trip to visit him when i was feeling a bit better. i said thank you, and hung up.

mickey rourke showed up at the funeral. he didn't want to hang around being melancholy, though. he told me that it would be in my best interests to get up off the ground and go for a walk with him. it was twilight. we snuck away from the wake together. we were walking through downtown. he wanted to take me into a bar, but i wasn't in the mood. he put his arms around me and kissed me on a street corner. he said that if i wasn't in the right frame of mind now, he knew that i would be soon, and that he would come back to me and love me forever when i gave him the signal that it was alright to do so. my stomach was in knots and i couldn't imagine ever loving anyone but leon ever again. as he walked away from me to go drinking on his own, i was left alone on the street corner in the dark, surrounding by hundreds of people having fun, and i vomited into the gutter, puking out misery. i couldn't remember how to get home. i wanted everything to be different.

thankfully when i woke up, everything was.

why do you love me?

you love me because i sweated through, grunted through, hollared through, moaned through
labour pains and yawning cervix and yes, you saw me tear
you love me because when it's time and money runs out i make meal after meal
from grated potatoes and weeping onions and i'll keep going
until all the dried beans have been soaked
all the tomato paste we bought on sale
all of it is digested and resting sleepily in the ocean
you love me because i cry when someone hurts my feelings,
you love me because i'll let my hair hang down over your face
and you love me because i like to bite your chin
you'll rub my feet
you'll tease my button
you'll hold our babies in your deep, dark loving
and you love me because i'll let you
touch my belly.