Remember when you left and came back today? That was something.
You sent pictures from the chandelier store. Why wasn’t the question.
We just do things now. The way my Dad drives and reads signs out loud.
Sweet Pea Café. Kitchen Factory. Color Your World. He had elderly clients
that wouldn’t take meetings on days they had to get groceries
because it would mean doing two things. Now here we are.
What might the evening hold? Which godforsaken movie will it be?
How many pictures of my own dinner can I take? I heard the first defense
against isolation is solitude. I thought about it three days and decided
to disagree. I read a book, my heart swells, but it’s no succor
in the early morning hours. The nights have really mastered my unraveling.
I should stop eating cheese before bed, but can’t seem to follow through
on good ideas. This is happening to everyone. You’re called to sit on your couch,
not war. Shakespeare wrote whatever during the plague. Of course they’re true,
how else could they be so boring? I can never remember now if I brushed
my teeth. I have to touch the bristles to tell if they’re dry. Which new strangers
will the windows bring? What lessons would they teach, if we could listen?
How many will die while we discuss it? Where to put the Christmas tree.
What the mail will bring. At what exact minute the darkness will complete itself.
Which walls, this time, should we beg to reveal the ghost?
And what should we name it? What would we name our child?
Let’s not make them the same. I’m sorry. I read Sylvia Plath.
It couldn’t have helped. How long will I look at an instrument
before I play one? Saturday we were set to have a fire
with the neighbours, but now it’ll rain. There goes the weekend.
