Two years ago, for six months, we were pregnant. Then we weren't. There will be no other baby. Doctor said. The swans in the marsh down the road raised noisy cygnets, but the silence we sank into was all I could hear. Until one day—morning, actually—you crawled across my barren landscape and plunged into the stillness. Long after you launched your grief into me, I listened. Deaf to the birds that sang again for you. The sex was good, it just seemed for nothing.

Tonight, silver moonlight slants through the blinds in broken stripes against the rumpled sheets, bends over my thigh and curls across your back. From deep in your sleep you murmur: Marian.

I don't know Marian.

All is black and white in this light. Marian is a gray image. I guess you need the color.

It hurt at first. Confirmation coming when I asked if we should start using condoms. You missed my sarcasm, but pulled one from your wallet. After six years of marriage. Later, I learned that you thought I was telling on myself. And took it in stride. Which gave me, first the idea, and then permission. Later still, I learned about Carla. Sue.... You say you do it for hope. I do it so I don't disappear.

Trumpeter swans aren't usual for this area, though the pair down the road set up housekeeping in the usual way. Together they built an expansive nest from cattails and bulrushes. Together, they scrounge food from the few square miles they'll likely inhabit for life. It keeps them out of trouble, this undistracted commitment.

We order takeout. Claim space we haven't earned—four bedrooms. Our range has no limit.

Water thickens in winter, increasing buoyancy. A deceptive lift. Last week I watched the swans paddle in slow circles, working together to prevent their home from freezing over. Imagined their conversation:

Cob:    Come on, babe, you're being ridiculous.

Pen:    Flying at night? In this wind? Who's being ridiculous. Have a white cap. On the rocks.

Cob:    We have to leave.

Pen:    But this is our home.

Cob:    We'll be frozen in.

Pen:    Nonsense, we've always been safe here.

Cob:    Don't you see. There's nothing left for us here.

Pen:    I won't leave.

Cob:    We can't stay.

I lie on top of you. Don't move, I say. Feel every place we're touching. I am alive. Inside. You raise your hips. No, I whisper. Breathe. We are dynamic in restraint. It's like a horse's muzzle surprising every cell. Or humming against a balloon. Every aspect of our beings become the orgasm. It's devastating. And we haven't moved at all. On the outside.

That was different, you say, please tell me you read a book. No book. Marco. He's tantric. But you say please, so I say yes. Relationships are hard enough without arguing over every little thing.

We blur lines and cross them like something partially erased. I've cried and smashed vases and stained the new carpet in the nursery—now exercise room—with blood from the cuts on my hands. You've flipped the coffee table and punched walls. We could destroy each other. 

A week ago, the pen struggled against the frozen mass that held her feet. I longed to help, but the cob stood guard. An adult swan can kill a grown man with the power of his wings. Four days he beat back crows and rats, until a thaw released her. Too late. The pen wilts, a lurid white spectral sinking beneath black water. On the fifth day the water freezes again. On the sixth day, the cob is gone.