Your mother's mug was on the hook

Your mother's mug was on the hook.

I opened the cabinet to find a glass.

I didn't mean to stop and look

but there it was — and below, the brass

of the wall itself gone pale and thin

where the handle hung for years, a ring

of faded paint the width of skin.

Proof of the particular thing

that staying does. You were next door

sorting coats into keep and gone.

I stood there, thumb against the pale floor

of that circle, thinking of home —

not the word. The thing the word

is pointing at and can't quite get.

The mug just hung there. Nothing stirred.

We boxed the kitchen up and left.