“Russian Ending" by Jerry Williams

[View this email on a browser]( [Forward to a friend]( [facebook-icon]( [tumblr-icon]( [twitter-icon]( May 23, 2017 [Russian Ending]( [Jerry Williams]( As in some demented romantic comedy, my wife and I divided the apartment in half. She took the living room and I took the bedroom. Bivouacked and bleeding, we waited for the lawyer to finish the stipulation so we could sign the pages and crawl away forever. I lived in her midst like an alien species. The exclusion zone sizzled like wet lightning when I whispered to outsiders on the house phone. Then came the morning of my departure: I awoke in civil twilight with my wife standing over me, looking down into my pallid face. For half a second, I thought she might strike me, but she grasped my hand and squeezed it goodbye, an astonishing tenderness glistening in her eyes, one final gift in all that pain and murderous détente, all that wailing and mortification of the flesh. On the way to the gallows of divorce, she held a merciful cup of clemency to my lips, and I drank deeply, I drank so deeply that I forgot what I’d done to deserve her. [Like this on Facebook]( [Share via Twitter]( Copyright © 2017 Jerry Williams. Used with permission of the author. [illustration]( About This Poem “It has taken me three years to come to peace with the inciting incident that inspired ‘Russian Ending.’ Some poems are practically too painful to write—which can sometimes turn out to be a recipe for artistic realization.” —Jerry Williams Jerry Williams is the author of Admission (Carnegie Mellon University Press, 2010). He is an associate professor at Marymount Manhattan College and lives in New York City. Poetry by Williams [Admission]( (Carnegie Mellon University Press, 2010) "In Praise of Their Divorce" by Tony Hoagland [read-more]( "Family Reunion" by Jeredith Merrin [read-more]( "Return" by Dorianne Laux [read-more]( Poem-a-Day Launched during National Poetry Month in 2006, [Poem-a-Day]( features new and previously unpublished poems by contemporary poets on weekdays and classic poems on weekends. If you enjoy Poem-a-Day, please consider making a [donation]( to help make it possible. [Small-Blue-RGB-poets.org-Logo]( Thanks for being a part of the Academy of American Poets community. To learn about other programs, including National Poetry Month, Poem in Your Pocket Day, the annual Poets Forum, and more, visit [Poets.org](. You are receiving this e-mail because you elected to subscribe to our mailing list. If you would like to unsubscribe, please click [here](. © Academy of American Poets 75 Maiden Lane, Suite 901, New York, NY 10038