Our Ghost

I.
It indicates change. It changes.
Your desk chair was next to my chair, at my desk
at the foot of our bed.
I saw it and woke you.

How could I have carried it
without scraping it along the floor?
You passed the spot coming to bed. You didn't see it then,
before you took off your clothes in the dark.

The chairs looked like we had been collaborating, looking or working together
at the computer -- a sign?

II.
It comes to you.
You bumped into the hallway
and called my name.
You closed the windows and checked the locks.
Why did you think it was something, and me?

III.
It comes when I'm distracted.
I was polishing the dining room table.
While I could have put the bottle of polish there,
I would have spilled polish.
Maybe I
wasn't looking, dropped it,
put it up while wiping the floor,
didn't look.
We left. When we returned, the bottle was
in the center of the table,
perfectly upside down, uncapped.

IV.
It is a new place.
The wind slaps the blinds shut.

The 2River View, 3_2 (Winter 1999)