11th Hour Sonnet

The sheets are filled with dog hair, but the dogs

are missing. All the doors are open. The earth

is rejecting the rain. Water tests our worth

through slow disintegration. All the cogs

of our lives have broken teeth. Nothing holds

its place no matter how hard you nail it down.

Water lips the steps. The sun scolds

us with its absence. Out the window, the town

stretches like a corpse no one will claim, and yet,

though the rising water smells of sulfur, and the phones

are severed ears, you wilt under the net

of my hands as if these troubles are our loans

on life come back to give evidence. Who cares what they say?

Even we don't know what we've done. How could they?