The Evening After

After James Merrill One evening, tired of games and each other, we spent watching our reflections on a screen — four in a two-seater, angling like sardines. For a dog’s hair I’d milked the wine, uttered words like, “that’s the cure!” swiveled the puckering glass like a mock-dandy, blood slushing at my temples, until the spill, a fatal expression on the white and navy, ruined the smoothness past salvation. A cough of salt, the patting of the fabric, perhaps enough.