The dark shirt held still and flat

The dark shirt, held still and flat,

rolled across, a sticky, soft attack.

It gathers everything, just like that,

no stray hair left, no going back.

Then the peel, a slow, revealing pull,

a thin film of the day's debris.

Each tiny thread, each fiber full

of what was on, and what was me.

Pet fur, white dust, a stranger's grey,

all caught in one translucent square.

Such small demands, to sweep away

the evidence of what was there.

A miniature, gross history,

all pressed to plastic, thin and wide.

Proof of a surface, briefly free,

with nothing left for it to hide.