Nacho table, extension cords, a locket
lost in the couch. This house crept up
on me like a new year: it was judiciously
January when one day I woke up
to December frosting hello on my window.
When I moved in, after a summer spent inert,
the floor was covered in dead crickets and dirt.
Now there’s unpaid parking tickets, fostered pups,
half-melted candles on the window sill. In this house,
I never want to be on my own, or still.
When the second-floor bathroom leaked
into the first, or the food fallen into burner caught aflame,
no one yelled or did anything worse. I can’t imagine
anyone being angry. On that first night, my throat ached
from talking late as I gazed into the bathroom mirror.
The air conditioner murmuring behind me like
it was giving me advice: take it in. take it all in.
This house has taken me all in.
This poem is about my roommates, who are the best example of UVA to me.
