Pipe Work

At two the radiator kicks on

and I sit up every time like it's a question

I haven't answered yet.

The sound is metal giving into heat—

a tick, a pause, a loose release,

the way you'd shift your weight in a chair

when you've been sitting too long

and don't want whoever's in the room

to know it.

I listened for twenty minutes, three nights ago,

trying to figure out if it was the pipes

or something else.

It was the pipes.

Just the pipes.

That was almost the worst part—

finding out and not feeling better,

just lying back down in the same dark

with the orange glow of the thermostat

watching from across the room,

small and useless.

The building is adjusting.

That's what buildings do.

I know.

I know.