Every time I came home

someone I didn’t know, or knew a little,
or perhaps quite well, was getting married.

Even the couples my parents didn’t know
were enough for endless musings over tea:

how they met, what she might wear,
whether the height difference mattered

(less than living together, more than baldness).

Soon, every time I came home
someone was having a baby, a crop

of grinning children on the fridge. I had nothing
to bring to that table. I pushed their questions

around my plate, going to bed hungry,
dreaming of other women’s kitchens.