When it's only the two of us,

it is not always clear who is right

and who is wrong.

Only that for one to push

the other must pull,

like those great saws

that can wail like violins

when played just right.

We take turns at the hammer

to build our traps.

And this too is a kind of partnership.

a woodcutter took to his daily work

with his axe and his usual eye for destruction.

It led him to an old fine tree

that contained a nymph

who was sleeping unawares,

but, oh, how she shrieked

at the first shaking blow.

She begged and she pleaded

"Please, stop!

In all this thick forest

you choose me to dismember,

Wait, hold your stroke!

Can you not hear me? No more!"

The woodcutter heard her cries,

but he was one to finish

what he had begun

and to ruin

what he had wounded.

The nymph was desperate.

"I'll grant you three wishes,

anything you want.

But you won't find them here, out in the world.

You must return to your home to claim your prize."

However this was a man whose daily urge

drove him outside to violence.

What welcoming home fosters that?

He didn't particularly believe the nymph,

but was moved.

His wife met him at the door and they resumed

where they had left off, with the bickering

and the sniping,

and the chipping away,

and the felling of their own dead, wooden love.

She was better at it than he was, like a hatchet on fire.

"Where have you been? How can you return here empty handed?"

He told her the truth and she was not impressed.

"I have slaved,

and I have sweated,

and I have martyred myself over this hot stove marriage,

trapped here while you frolic with nymphs,

and bring home lies and failure.

I suffer this union for you - don't you forget that.

Each day I am abandoned."

She cut away at him with surgical skill.

She knew when to find the better striking angle

that would leave him upright, held by a few splinters.

He was no nymph,

and he had no wishes to offer.

So he hid away in the woods with his little axe

and in sleep each night

with his soul hewn

and hollowed by her blade.

Dinners were daily, calculated tragedies;

cooked-up proof of her selfless devotion

and his own meager abilities to provide.

Her thin soups left him hungry,

yet he generally knew not to complain.

Grateful for anything wet and lukewarm.

"I wish there was a sausage for this soup," he muttered.

She was about to agree, in a way that would twist the knife most intimately

when suddenly a beefy link

dropped into his bowl.

Well now,

if that didn't shut her up for three seconds.

But then, oh, how she dug into him.

She spit into her hands and rubbed them together,

took up the haft and swung madly.

For if the first wish came true, then the rest were waiting.

"How could you waste a wish like that?

Of all the things I need around here-"

She complained vigorously,

But he was untouchable and serene.

He stared at her puffy red face

and working mouth.

Across the table, she looked miles distant.

"I wish this sausage was on the end of your nose."

It was ridiculous and instant.

She squealed in distress,

while he revelled in petty vengeance.

Because she was right,

she was always right;

he was wasting his wishes.

He could have wished for peace between them.

He could have wished for old love resurgent.

He could have wished for children,

for some kind of renewal,

or a simple and painless divorce.

But it was now too late

to be so mature.

The third wish came and went,

undoing all this mischief,

and they were back where they started,

staring in silence across the uncomfortable spread

of their cooling meal.

And yes, it was funny.

And yes, she got what was coming to her,

more or less.

But the memory of what could have been

that each kept privately

would return later in the dark,

in bed, back to back,

or while he exhausted himself at the axe,

pulling down the world - one tree at a time,

or while she cried without knowing why,

sweeping the ashes from the hearth.