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Sof a


by Elizabeth Kate Switaj


My softness craves your weight. Give me your shape, and I won't resist it. Or, rather, I will but just enough to recall it. I can only give that much, and that's my fatal flaw. If I were a more pliable thing, I could let go of these impressions. The stains—coffee, blood, wine, and worse—would be something else, but maybe if I could forget the shapes of his ass and legs, the stain remover you've so generously dabbed upon me would work.

Is that reasonable? Couches never get much education in chemistry or how our bodies work. Is that even a discipline? Carpentry? Who makes me understands me?

Rest on me. Replace his impression with yours. Even if I'm only the sofa you keep until you can afford something younger and Swedish. Even if I know you'll heave me to the curb one big trash night. Erase him. I need your heft.

It's my resistance that needs your bones, my strength that needs your fat.
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