Every Other Weekend
I expect to her it felt like failure,
eight steps down to the basement,
fifty precious dollars less a month
than the first floor with a balcony rail
and a partially obstructed view to the future.
This is why they call it garden level,
I always thought,
brushing by her irrepressible hanging plants,
craving the cool surrender of descent
over the sweat and elbows of climb.
I remember myself reflected infinitely
in the six paneled mirror
around the clawfoot tub,
three steps up on carpet, with stage lighting—
an extravagant queen’s welcome
for not yet breasts and misdirected teeth.
The 2am freight train
rattled hollow doors and the electric stove,
barely moved the wood block picture frame
wedged between the Big Book
and a Christmas cactus.
She worried I could not sleep through it.
I tried not to.
The predictable, dream-riddled earthquake
was assurance,
that the world can shake mightily
The predictable, dream-riddled earthquake
was assurance,
that the world can shake mightily
and not crumble.
