Alkali

Under the sink where the pipes always sweat,

I found the green box, all sticky and wet.

It had leaked a white trail like a dry, salty bleed,

the kind of harsh powder a dirty house needs.

I got on my knees with a bucket and rag,

and tore back the flap of the cardboard snag.

It smells like a laundry room in nineteen-eighty-four,

sharp and unforgiving against the linoleum floor.

It burns in the cuts on my knuckles and thumb,

a chemical penance that makes the skin numb.

I scrub until the tile is a blinding, flat white,

trying to bleach out the stains of a very long night.