Breaking Up Is Hard to Do

On Friday afternoon David said he was divesting his holdings
                     in Stephanie dot org.
And Cindy announced she was getting rid of all her Dan-obelia,
                and did anyone want a tennis racket or a cardigan?

Alice told Michael that she was transplanting herself
                        to another brand of potting soil
And Jason composed a 3-chord blues song called
                   “I Can’t Rake Your Leaves Anymore Mama,”
then insisted on playing it
                         over his speakerphone to Ellen.

The moon rose up in the western sky
                           with an expression of complete exhaustion,
like a 38-year old single mother
                standing at the edge of the playground. Right at that moment

Betty was extracting coil after coil of Andrew’s
                              emotional intestines
                   through a verbal incision she had made in his heart,
and Jane was parachuting into an Ani Difranco concert
                    wearing a banner saying, Get Lost, Mark Resnick.

That’s how you find out:
out of the blue.
And it hurts, baby, it really hurts,
because breaking up is hard to do.

 

Tony Hoagland, Hard Rain (Hollyridge Press, 2005)