only the good

it was a very poetic moment

when she raised the skillet

above her head,

bared her teeth

and swung balletic with

such momentum

he could swear this time

she would actually, finally

take flight.

it was a familiar dance

where he would read

a thousand nightmares

in her eyes while

she spewed profanities

and lashed out at the world

a screaming banshee.

in a theatre of war she

would have been a general.

the battle, he knew

was inside her head,

private,

not for him to fight,

so as he retrieves her

tiny frame from the floor,

kisses her forehead,

tells her the war cry

he knew,

"only the good die young baby"

and hopes in his heart

that it isn't true.