Morning In The Burned House
In the burned house I am eating breakfast.
You understand: there is no house,
there is no breakfast, yet here I'm.
The spoon which was melted scrapes
against the bowl which was melted also.
No one else is around.
Where have they gone to, brother and sister,
mother and father?
Off along the shore, perhaps.
Their clothes are still on the hangers,
their dishes piled beside the sink, which
is beside the woodstove with its grate
and sooty kettle,
every detail clear, tin cup and rippled mirror.
The day is bright and songless,
the lake is blue, the forest watchful.
In the east a bank of cloud rises up
silently like dark bread.
I can see the swirls in the oilcloth.
I can see the flaws in the glass, those
flares where the sun hits them.
I can't see my own arms and legs or know
if this is a trap or blessing, finding myself
back here, where everything
in this house has long been over, kettle
and mirror, spoon and bowl, including
my own body,
including the body I had then, including
the body I have now as I sit at this morning
table, alone and happy,
bare child's feet on the scorched floorboards
(I can almost see)
in my burning clothes, the tin green shorts
and grubby yellow T-shirt holding my cindery,
non- existent, radiant flesh.
Incandescent.
