Inventory of a Borrowed Kitchen

The previous tenant left a single spoon in the drawer, tarnished at the bowl where another mouth had pressed, and a salt shaker half-full of weather.

I learn the cabinets by their hesitation — the one above the stove that swings too eager, the one beneath the sink that holds its breath against the pipes.

Through the window, a sycamore writes the same sentence over and over on the white wall, erases it, begins again. I am learning to read in this language of leaf-shadow and slow afternoon.

Tonight I boil water for no reason but the sound it makes arriving, the kettle clearing its throat like a guest who has something to say and is waiting to be asked.

Somewhere a door I have not yet opened keeps a small darkness for me, folded like a napkin, patient, the shape of a room I will later call mine.