Compound Interest

The pickle jar lid wouldn't budge an inch

so I leaned in with the weight of my shoulder.

That’s when I saw the thumb joint flinch

and the knuckle look suddenly forty years older.

It’s his hand. The same hitch in the bone,

the same stubborn refusal to open or bend.

I didn't just get his temper or his tone;

I got the way his mechanics start to end.

Under the bed, the shoebox is full of the rest:

invoices yellowed and brittle with his name.

I’m paying for a heart that failed the test

with a body that’s learning to fail the same.