Perimenopause

I am on day 13 of my period 
    getting our house ready  
for sale. Our tenants left a freezer 
     full of ice cream. They left 
mattresses, and a jewelry box  
     with nipple studs. They burned 
a black candle in a white bathtub.  
     Did I mention I am on day 13 
of my period? 
     Not my cycle—my period. I nursed  
two of my children until their first year  
     yet my period returned  
after only six months.  
Our tenants left monitors, silverware, plates,  
Nerf guns and darts. They left a blender,  
a coffee maker, a four-slice toaster. A tent,                
dressers, a five-pound bag of sugar.  
Wooden hangers! To be that young! To try 
on adulthood, decide it’s not you— 
     to leave it all behind.   

SUZANNE FRISCHKORN

Suzanne Frischkorn is the author of Fixed Star (JackLeg Press 2022), Whipsaw (forthcoming in 2024 from Anhinga Press), Girl on a Bridge and Lit Windowpane (both from MSRP), and five chapbooks. She is an editor at $ – Poetry Is Currency, and serves on the Terrain.org editorial board.