My lord I rubbed the sleep from my eyes this morning
To hear no gruesome din of men downstairs
No demands of food or drink, no thunderous thug-stomp
In my halls. Your halls.

Do me a kindness and imagine my unease—I am now used
To waking to faraway screams, the rape
Of servant women in the corridors.

Mine was a hideous alarm: I’d neglected my unraveling
And slept, and not because I’d loved you less but
O Gods! what stiffness and fatigue.
I woke and thought:
What a selfish fool I am. The world is coming to an end.

Massaging my red fingers, my fingers that looked like bones, I went
And my bare feet slid down stairs slicked with blood.
My gown drank it greedily, chilling my legs so that I could hardly think
How I would only pretend to weave today.

My lord, my hands went to my face
As in the great hall I smelled your sweat beneath the stench,
And weaving between ruined bodies I saw your bow taken from the mantle
And my work thrown, tangled with its warp threads.
You had come back, and then departed,
And had done my unraveling for me.