Exerpt From Gaton's Latest Book

While this might not be the best example of Chris Gaton's work, he asked me to share a work about his late wife before anything else:

Periodontal Maidenhead

Someday soon when I’m too old and deaf
to remember that I’ve fallen asleep
with the television too loud, a woman screaming
in a film will drive my neighbors
to report me to the police

and after they burst in, guns out and raised,
arresting me, they’ll bring in the scientists
with the white plastic suits
and black lights
and find our trails of blood:

yours on the sheets, mine in the sink.
Where’s the body? they’ll ask me
in the interrogation room. The blood
told them about a murder and I can’t
bring myself to talk about your wedding gift.

It is a short work, emotional without being burdensome. He finds a comical approach to dealing with his grief. It is sexual without being graphic. Well, perhaps a little graphic, but in a way that is tender and familiar, not vulgar.