I don’t miss driving home from work
Parking up the road
Too worried to cover that last half mile
Waiting half an hour

Knowing that the wine would smile
Long before you asked
“How was your day?”
Which you did sometimes

I was grateful for that
And faintly hopeful
Even though anything more than “Fine”
Resulted in glazed eyes

The words that we needed were never birthed
but spoken inwardly
And loudly
In Pentecostal tongues

The fight we never had was a brutal attrition
Fought in damp shadows
At increasing range
Wielding sharpened jibes

The dams never broke
And you will never know
Who won

For we are both happier now