That dirt stain on the shag
is gone and all
the photographs of me.
My cold indention
in our mattress heals
tonight, and when
the chandelier’s
extinguished now no wall
will be polluted
by the awkward sprawl
of my unbalanced shadow.
Only then,
when one poor fingerprint
is all that pins
my history to the light
switch in the hall,
can I breathe freely
as I wipe that last
loose blemish clean.
The rooms will exhale too,
but briefly, since my leaving
means a new
piano, marble counters,
and a vast
confab of furniture
without a past
whose future’s only
sutured now to you.
