"Call to Arms"

By Val Haynes

An argument hardens
between the hush. And one

taunt from a dried-up throat waits
the fossil sets, the sticks-and-stones

already thrown, already air born
an unspoken damage

A promise can begin
with fluted crystal. And be smashed.

A marriage has other dictates
drains one party of its

singularity. Cannot be smashed
up. Bones are picked. Regurgitated.

Insults with its remembered master key
the skeletons revealed.

The ransacked closet drawers
rummaged through day after day

The scrutiny of and scrutiny of
And again the scrutiny of her every word and action


The bones splintering
Hairline fractures over and over

The beaten down batterer
born to be the joke of the boardroom

Atones with flowers to bed the mistress
Beneath some glacial rock


Val Haynes is a writer, actress and singer who is now a full-time student studying writing and journalism at the University of Albany. She has a CD called "Lonesome Val."