Something

A wind through the screen
wakes your body gnarled in sheets
and you remember the desperate thing
you did. A manila moth clicks shut
by the floorboards. You were miles from here.
In the dim corners, spiders whirr
and the mice take up a secret
grumbling in the walls.
No one knew you. Far off there’s a flash
then rumbling shakes the house.
Wooden planks rattle, a plant
collapses on the porch. Something
made you so lonely, something shivers
down your leg as the rain begins.

From Years that Answer (Harper & Row, 1980)