It's already summer, and we’re getting rid

of clothes, getting ready to greet

the scorching days ahead;

making the place airy and less cluttered.

We’re living on the edge, restructuring the house,

getting rid of old furnitures,

obsolete machineries and funny gadgets.

A small table in the kitchen for two. Our world is

changing, our wardrobes mostly empty;

gone are the skinny jeans and the fancy moccasins—

the windchime and the trinkets.

When someone comes to visit and admire

our complete works of Yeats,

the peacock feather in the open thesaurus,

the mantle vase on a shelf, we say

take them. This is the most important

time of all, the age of dissipation,

knowing full well what we’re divesting is

like the fragrance of a burning incense stick

that lingers hours after it has been doused.

An ordinary Friday afternoon

when one of us stared

and the other one just laughed.

[Editor’s Note: Publication of this poem was made possible by a gift from an anonymous donor during our annual Kickstarter.]