The Brass Leftover

It fell from the pocket of my heavy coat,

a brass fish hitting the kitchen tile.

Three years of dust inside a wool throat,

and now it’s here, mocking me for a while.

I remember the way your thumb would rest

on the tarnish of that small, metallic fin.

We were always trying to pass some test

that neither of us was ever going to win.

It’s a bottle opener, weighted and blunt,

staying behind while everything else is gone.

A hollow trophy from a desperate hunt

found in the dark and brought into the dawn.