Whatever’s
down there
can’t find me
on the top step.
Can’t touch me on
my stoop. I bounce tennis
***** here till they clip a
step an roll, missing every other
on its way to where it smells really
good but things are lost.  Must, detergent,
and a little bit of something else races through
innocent nostrils who could tell you all about cut
grass and baseball fields, leaf piles and orange juice,
oatmeal cookies and sunday dinners, but nothing about down
there.  Besides every night at eight when the noise calls my mom
downstairs, far past my stoop, she returns with The things I lost.
And a pile of warm, warm clothes smelling of must, detergent and a little
something else.