This past Christmas, I was
delegated to beat the pie-cream
until it whipped.
And as my whisk, gnarled on
one loop, made eddies in the
off-white pool, I managed to drift to the antique
wallpaper of a room of heartbroken
cardiologists, who were arguing over
the existence of fated love.
The raucous skeptics fervently
waved wilted carnations and rotten charm
in the faces of the believers who could
only counter with
an anxious twiddle
of their tarnished wedding bands.
I drew this feverish reverie into the
thickening mire, folding in visions
of aimless love with shaved spice and
palm-measured sugar.
And as their claims ricocheted around
the room, I carelessly whipped
away, the cream’s frosted peaks
finally ceasing to droop.
The believers, now defeated, lifted their
stethoscopes to listen for love-clogged arteries,
but all they heard, amidst their hollow breath,
was the broken beat of a heart.