who is doing all this work on this old house?
painting & repairing & paying to have it repaired
a last-gasp house I’ll no doubt be pried out of
when sense or mobility deserts me, yet this week
I search with an electronic tool for wall studs
pound finishing nails into baseboards my brother
ripped to the chosen width, I measure, saw, & sand
paint & repaint, all to better the appearance of
hide the faults of a hundred-year-old house
I trust will last decades longer than I will
no paint or boards or nails can slow my ruin
deepening fissures fill with tears from eyes
too slack to hold them, not grief but leakage
every night in dreams I play my younger self
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