Sanitize

The kettle starts to scream a jagged note

while I clear the table and take your coat.

I pour the boiling water on the stack

and wait to hear the cheap ceramic crack.

You watched the steam go thick and white and high,

and asked me why I did it with a sigh.

My mother thought the soap was never enough

to kill the invisible and heavy stuff.

She scrubbed the germs away until her hands

were red and mapped with deep and stinging strands.

I didn't know the tap was meant to be

sufficient for a person such as me.