Atlas of Small Noises

In the kitchen, the kettle gathers its weather, a white hiss climbing the glass like a mountain trail; the spoon taps out a latitude of morning.

I map the house by what it offers to the ear: floorboards giving their shy applause, the refrigerator's low, steady polestar.

Outside, bicycles stitch the avenue with thread, wet tires translating puddles into syllables; a bus exhales, a slow bell of departing.

By evening I fold the day into a pocket, carry the atlas of small noises to bed, and sleep on the soft grid of their remembering.