I sit crooked in my chair
A dog plays alone
Spider-man holds my coffee
Salt and pepper on the table from last night’s dinner
An empty cup
My phone and another empty cup
Countless papers hold the table down
As if at any moment it could float away
A pumpkin from Halloween
A deceased Christmas cactus
An untended fairy garden

We are not adept at noticing the small things
We are not ones to clean up after ourselves
We are not good at good-byes
We are constantly out-waiting everyone else
Holding on for someone to clean our mess
Confident that someone else will be less patient than ourselves
This will bother you before it bothers me

It bothers me
But I cannot do it alone
I cannot be the maid
I cannot look after the possessions of five
In addition to my two jobs
And so I pick my battles
I learn to let go
I put on the same blinders you have
Pretend it doesn’t exist
So that when I do have time and energy
I have forgotten all about it