To build a home

After one of those peaceful evenings without strife

Where your chest knows my name and rises and falls my weary head to it

And sleep comes Sunday morning easy

And our mouth's in O's because that is the last syllable of both our names

Then we both are wrenched out of sleep when we hear the crack

From the balcony we both see a line running from one side of the apartment to the other

We seek and find relief in each other's eyes

We thought the earth had cracked right open and threw us on either side

Separated eternally

But we called the landlord and forgot all about it

When we should have seen it for what it was

That homes are built to contract and expand

We were built too co-dependently close together

And there was not enough room for either of us to grow, to breathe

You exploded

I imploded

We called time

Cracks in rental homes are other people's problem