Summary

The speaker describes the way that she repeatedly ties her heart to the headboard of the bed she shares with her husband. Her patchwork cries "harden against his hand" as the sounds dies off and transform into something else (4).

The speaker proclaims her husband's boredom, stating that she can clearly observe it. She then asks a rhetorical question about the ways she receives his bribes and places flowers in water. On their dinner table decorated with lace belonging to the speaker's mother's, the speaker watches her husband cut the "gored / Roasts" and serve the family "slivers" of meat (6-7).

After a pause, the speaker discloses the way she stays physically intimate with her husband for the sake of family unity. Specifically, she is concerned with her children's well-being. However, the speaker's personal reward is the burden of waking up to their household. On typical...