Weight Bearing

The tile is cold and unforgiving.

I kneel to scrub the ring of mildew

from the base of the toilet tank.

The joint catches, a dry grinding

of stone against stone.

I look down at the skin,

at the scar that has lived there since 1994.

It is a pale, jagged river

flowing through the center of my map.

The rain is coming. I can feel it

in the metal and the gristle,

the hardware of a body

starting to remember its own age.