down the stairs, where the creak-feet of descent
will silence a cricket in the room; there with couch
and the bookstand, oak and glass....
sedate features; the odd bust of an Inuit matriarch-
staring at your blouse like it were forged
in blasphemies and trade winds.
down there, where we keep the cat riveted to the headlights
of our armored car.

in the seam

the coffee table is strewn, right down the middle
with old magazines and straw placemats.
a stain that never fades,
stands in the garden of cigarette butts and dog-eared -
post-it notes
to a glass scarecrow.
a mound of bric-a-brac
and fingerprints.

it's sticky
where two people
made the love
that made the mess...

but it's hollow where they never met.
and you can see the carpet through the permafrost.
our lens
immune to domain.
free to see the whimsy
in a spot of bother
about a broken
heart.

down where the television skin is the thickest. our ironic muse.
just a spritz of cultured sabotage,
and the good sense to go mad
without disturbing the peace....
the same peace that almost -
cost us the war.

at the very least.