A Bedtime Story

a poem by Jan Oskar Hansen

The nice man from the police told her to be prepared for the worst
her husband, Hans had disappeared when out fishing in the bay a week ago,
they had found his boat,
frogmen were looking for his body,
but for now he was only listed as missing.
Klara didn’t believe it
she was sure Hans had feigned his own disappearance
and was living with a trollop in another town,
just wait, she angrily murmured, till you come back.
She held on to her ire as she gutted a haddock she had bought for her
and Sam, the cat
and there amongst revolting gore a finger she knew well;
the cat meowed she turned and there Hans stood in the doorway smiling!
too much she fainted.
Getting up from the floor Sam sat on the kitchen table licking its lips,
the finger was gone, just my imagination she thought,
but as tears swelled
and grief replaced fury
she knew that she was a widow now.