Curtains

Three sets of them, one

for each croaking window, breathing hot air

like that of the summer we’d spent, how

many years ago now.

Listen, last night

I, blackening this new linen with smoke,

heard the crickets again, the muffled

crack of heat lightning. I felt

the wind beat one way, then another.

How did it go? What did we say?

Don’t look at me, we cried, I’m changing.

I become my mother or your sister,

having already been through this.

You follow shortly after. Waves

appear distinct, though they are not.

It comes down to this: a set of windows, dressed.

Something unfettered. Something muzzled.