Untidy Life

My back pockets are filling with lists of things I must do
before this trip over an ocean.

I have to talk to the neighbor’s kid so she’ll check on the cats.
I have to stop the mail.

I have to clean my clothes, my apartment, what with the kid coming over,
clean out my back pockets, the cat’s litter.

I’m busying myself with the tasks of tidying, management,
packing all these little moments into their tiny boxes,

packing those tiny boxes into leather suitcases
latching those leather suitcases with metal buckles

Wood crating those leather and metal suitcases and
labeling them with paper and ink till everything is stacked in the center of the room.

This is what I am busying myself with,
watching the cats cry at shadows and pace the room in their anxiety.

Watching you tell me, darling, there is time for everything. Relax. Have a drink with me.
But I have this trip to take, and if I don’t come back

If I slip into the crowd of another city, to have another life,
and I don’t come back to this one.
If I just keep moving, passport in hand, keep taking, and keep boarding trains, well

I just want to make sure it’s neat when the police come to move everything out.