shyness, if an apology

To try the kitchen dimmer switches, hat hooks, all the detritus falling left of our apartment one night in Brooklyn. The firemen ritualistically wear their garb, off duty, moving up the quiet stairs to even quiet sleep. Once rumored to fight there, to throw plates out half eaten, and complain about the amount of light through the windows in winter. I’m alone as once with that bottle of fake milk, making ways around the glossy red stairs, still trying to pinch things into place. I had a hammer. Still a hammer until the cows barrel up drunk, if only in my mind drunk, I will do the brandishing. We make the gluey pots shine, and watch the skin about my hands fall mothy to the floor. There’s no more corn in the manager. There’s twice as much rice in the fridge. We eat in the cool aftermath of kalidescopes, never wondering where to insert them, where our eyes go briefly. As do colors.