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  • The American Poetry Review

    TWO POEMS

    Sep 01, 2020 2 minutes
    STEPHEN S. MILLS

    In Life My Husband Helps Put a Woman Back Together Again

    Her arm was in the other roomwhen he arrived—not with her bodystill breathing in the livingroom. In and out of consciousness.And blood of course.So he retrieved the arm—lifted it into a bag full of herfreezer contents(paramedics do not carry ice—it would melt).This made him think of lifting his dead catafter he hit it with his car as a teenager:still warm.He vomited then,but now he is a professional.But still there’s something alarming about a pieceof a body completely separatedfrom that body,which is somehow still surviving.An arm thought to be cut off by a lovernow on the run.Detachedbut can maybe be reattached.Modern medicine and all.Most things do not get to my husband.He brushes off the sick.The tragic.The suicides.But todaywhen he gets home, he wants to hold me.Says he will keep me safeas if I’m the one who needs reassurance.I smile.Kiss him.Tell him our three-legged dog gets along just fine:

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