i was thinking


why your pants are in my pile and 


one of my two pairs of jeans is in the wash


when the door slammed behind you.



the other was under a crate for dogs blocking the closet

and i had to hurl packages from Hillhouse Home across the room,

started rifling through the syrup-filled kitchen trash downstairs

when you stole out the alley in a black SUV (the one your parents bought).



you had said you maybe threw away my new $40 pair of boxer-briefs still in the wrap,
like how my meerschaum pipe disappeared,
after you tore me from another bed with the baby, then changed the music she and I were bouncing to from disco tunes to 50s singles,
whither my annual dalliance.



you and she are gone, and I'm half-naked with a house of clothes that aren't mine.