I remember when you lived with us,

your easy smile, the missing teeth concealed,

your blond hair and giant, gentle hands.

You spread out from a chair as if still growing

even though you were thirty

and all your growing was done.

You’d come home laughing

I was only a little bit bad, you said.

Held up by the wall

until you slid down to the floor in the laundry room.

I tried to kick you out

but you gave me a roll of hot, sweaty bills, and that was that.

We lived that way for some time,

mashed potatoes and ground beef,

curry made you sick, the smell of it.

You’d come home laughing,

but then you’d come home shaking

and need gas money so you could go to work.

Our pretty balcony 

in the sunshine, the view

gradually obscured by beer cans, the drain clogged by butts

until it became a puddle of misery on the second floor.

You had to go, but you had no place to go.

We stood for a while, unmoving.

I remember when you lived with us,

your wide mouth, your soft hair and strong body,

you poured out on the chair like molten lava,

a smoking, drinking volcano,

but you eroded, 

and finally washed away.