Mistake
Adah, 1936
Cheyenne, Wyoming

by Anna Citrino


The clouds hung low to the ground, heavy, ready
to break loose in storm when Raymond stepped through
the door with his perfect buttons and shining belt buckle,
back straight, chin pointed, head held high.

My workday at the laundry was nearly finished.
I handed him his newly pressed clothes and he
inspected them with approval.

I thought I wanted a trim, firm man,
who appreciated order, knew how to take charge,
a stable man with steady work.

The world is full of disasters—
people lose their homes, their health,
the ones they love.
I’d lost Gerard long before I expected.
What I couldn’t bear after Gerard’s death
was the stillness in the house, the dust motes
hanging in the air’s static light.

I knew the prejudice against single women,
and had my own questions about where
my life would go if I remained alone.

I wanted better than that.

A coal or oil field worker smelling of mineral,
sediment under the fingernails that wouldn’t
wash out, a farmer, railroad man, or cattle rancher—
those men weren’t for me.

A clean-cut military man, Raymond seemed
a better option. He knew I was a laundry supervisor,
and what that suggested, said he wanted
a woman with experience.

After we’d married, though, he wanted someone else.

“Your hair’s a mess,” he’d bluntly pronounce,
“Don’t wear that,” or he’d bark, “Stop talking!”
then later ask why I never laughed.
.
Upon entering the house, he’d run his finger
along the door frame and tabletop to see how well
I’d dusted, and he followed me to work, concerned
I’d talk with someone he didn’t approve of.

What I don’t want to see is how, like Raymond,
I look at others and criticize
their clothes, how they should be cleaner
or their house better kept, how I fault those
whose voices are too weak or shrill—
how easily I find shame in others
when daily I see the hundred ways
I’ll never be enough.

When Raymond started sleeping around,
I quit cooking and ironing.
I wasn’t going to play that role.

I wanted the words to fling in Raymond’s face, curses
to cut through his self-perfection, his petty rules,
his delusion of control.

Instead, I ripped the buttons from his shirts,
drug his jacket through the mud,
slammed the door on the empty house,
went to the courthouse,
and filed for divorce.


* * * * *

"Mistake" is part of Anna Citrino's growing longer work of related poems. More poems from the longer work were posted here on November 10, 2023 and November 11, 2023, and one of three more will follow tomorrow.

Anna Citrino is the author of A Space Between, and Buoyant,  Saudade, and To Find a River. Anna taught abroad in six different countries: Turkey, Kuwait, Singapore, Saudi Arabia, India, and the UK. Her work has appeared in Bellowing Ark, Canary, Evening Street Review, Indelible, Paterson Literary Review, phren-z, Poppy Road Review, and the Porter Gulch Review, among other literary journals. On most any day you can find her going for walks near the coast or biking on paths through rolling hills where she lives in Sonoma County, California. Read more of her writing at annacitrino.com.