Inventory of a Borrowed Kitchen

The previous tenant left a colander shaped like a moon with too many holes, a saucepan whose handle wobbles when you tilt it toward the light, two forks, no knives.

I learned the cupboard by braille, counting jars by the rattle of their lids: cumin, salt, something gone amber that might have once been honey, might still be, in the right century.

The window above the sink frames a brick wall and one ambitious vine threading itself through mortar. In the morning, the kettle whistles in a key I do not know.

I cook for one and set two plates, not from grief but from habit, the way some houses keep a chair pulled out for weather, for the door's small intermissions.

When I leave, I will leave the colander, the wobble, the amber, and a single new spoon — proof that someone passed through and learned the shape of staying.