Checked

Fifteen a month for four years —

I'd mostly stopped knowing what was in there.

A box from when we shared the apartment:

her mugs in newspaper, the lamp, the chair.

Under the lampshade: a phone book.

Yellow spine gone pale at the crack.

Pages swollen from the winters.

I almost put it back.

I flipped through. Found the name I'd checked

in blue ballpoint — faded but still.

The kind of mark you make before you dial,

which means I dialed. Which means I will

always have done that. I put it back.

Closed the box. Drove home from there.

Paid for one more month of the unit.

The check mark in the book. The chair.