What My Body Remembers

The smell came through the open window

and I was eight years old again,

standing in the backyard,

watching my dog shake—

water flying off like she was trying

to shake off her whole body,

like the bath had changed her

into something that needed to escape.

That smell.

I haven't smelled it in maybe fifteen years.

It doesn't smell good.

It smells like wet fur and shampoo

and something else—

something like the inside of a wet towel,

like something that's been alive

and just been forced

to be clean.

My neighbor was washing hers this afternoon.

I could smell it from inside my apartment,

coming through the window I'd opened

for fresh air.

I closed the window.

Then I opened it again.

I sat there breathing it in

and trying to remember

who I was when I had a dog,

when I was the kind of person

who had things that loved me,

who took care of things,

who was smaller and less careful

about what I let matter.

The smell is gone now.

She's moved on to something else.

But I'm still sitting here

trying to remember

how to be that person again,

or if that person is even still in here

somewhere,

underneath all of this.