Vent

The warm air hit my face

and I stopped in place.

Someone's dryer vent

exhaling the scent of fabric softener,

someone's clean laundry floating out

into the street where I'm standing,

a stranger's domestic life

made visible by heat and smell.

This is intimacy without consent—

to catch the soap, the warmth,

the evidence of a life being lived

inside that building,

someone folding someone else's socks,

someone waiting for the cycle to end

just like I do.

The warmth faded as I walked.

But I carried that smell,

that borrowed heat,

the knowledge that behind that vent

someone was ordinary,

someone was real,

someone was washing away the day

just like me.

And I was close enough to know it,

far enough not to intrude.