Blank Slate

The rain has been a gray curtain for three days,

blurring the yard and the edge of the street.

I flip the bank's card to find the next phase,

but the grid is as white as a fresh-laundered sheet.

No dental checkups, no dinners at eight,

just sixty-four squares of a clean, quiet void.

A pen with a chewed cap is lying in wait

by a pile of mail that I’ve mostly avoided.

It’s a strange kind of peace, or a strange kind of theft,

to look at a month and see nothing is left.