poem in progress: "In a Name"

In a Name

With a swish of white and two guttural utterings,

I did.

It’s all here in black and lace.

I’ve taken on a part of him, in body and name;

and after all these years I have this bold new tattoo:

Missus. Wife.

So I slip

into my strange and sudden new name

and find it far less comfortable

than that slyly mentioned negligée.

This should be no surprise.

Weeks earlier the two of us held hands in front of that cold, grey desk

as she sat with her ballpoint hovering over the blank.

She blinked and asked me, What is your name?

In a quick scribble,

a bright penflash across the page or a check,

here’s another inky red link between us at the end of my poems.

-HMMooreNiver

Nov. 2007