You shun
calls, work, friends
night sleep
grooming
equilibrium
an actual job
and what you call
my need to control.

I fear
the loose robes
you wrap around
your hours
theft
collection agencies
car wrecks and
cocaine’s seductive
lies.

But yet I hope.

Louise Kantro teaches high school and received her MFA in Creative Writing in 2003.  She has published and/or won prizes for more than two dozen stories.  Married for thirty-five years, with two grown sons, she lives in a messy house with her husband and two cats.