I was shouting about the glasses in the bottom rack

I was shouting about the glasses in the bottom rack,

how the jets can't reach if you overlap the bowls,

when I saw my own hand reflected in the microwave door.

It wasn't my hand. It was a thick, serrated ghost.

I sat down and let out this heavy, rattling sigh—

a sound from 1994, a sound of wood-paneling

and unpaid bills and the slow rot of a Tuesday.

I looked at the yellowing callus on my middle finger

where the pen has dug a trench for thirty years.

It’s the same geography. The same stubborn grip.

I am becoming a collection of his worst habits,

a map of frustrations I promised I’d never draw,

folding myself into the chair exactly the way he did

before he’d even said a word. The dishwasher is humming

and I’m just sitting here, holding my own wrist

like I’m trying to keep a stranger from leaving the room.