Steps

by Perry L. Powell

We have forgotten more
than we remember
standing before this sash window
in the haze of an afternoon's
leftovers.

Yesterday's stains remain uncleaned
on an oak floor, in a living room,
dark and irregular like vultures
caged in planks with raw pinned wings
while we avoid what
we avoid today.

A pattern to this, the unspoken
repetition behind
silence and love and body
as though disease
was merely
another way to keep breathing in.