For a month, my father’s sister slept
on the furry, black sleeper couch, spilling
red wine, breastmilk, baby drool, and spit-up.
She pocked the black fur with cigarette burns.
Drunk, she bought a crib, to go where?
When the heavy box arrived, she drunk-pushed
the load into the hallway and a staple
ripped a skid-line into the new linoleum.
We dropped the ruined couch at the dump.
The scar in the hall remained. My mother
greeted that skidded rip each time she entered
the house and when she walked barefoot
from the garage with a basket of clean clothes,
she felt that rough wound with her toes.
