The Catch

The white paint is a powder on the floor,

ground down by years of forcing it to slide.

It’s not a clean break like a slamming door,

but a slow, stubborn friction kept inside.

I braced my foot against the lower frame

and pulled until my shoulder went quite tight.

The wood is swollen, playing at a game

of holding onto forks with all its might.

You can’t fix a house that wants to swell,

expanding in the dampness of the night.

It’s just a drawer, but I can usually tell

when nothing in the kitchen’s going right.