Available for a Day Like This

At ten, my alarm
tinkled at the edge of sleep.
I let it.

There were two more hours in me,
but a man was coming
to repair the sink.

At eleven twenty, the intercom
rang me back into my body.

He climbed the stairs slowly,
carrying the smell of damp clothes,
a dog asleep in the car
long after the beach.

He left the sink working
and the question of payment
unasked.

Already, the day
was giving me things.

My mother says there are two hundred
and ten stairs on the Montmartre hill.
Perhaps she counted.
Perhaps she read it somewhere.

I believe her.
My mother knows the numbers
of things I simply walk through.

Five times I climbed them.
On the phone, my best friend
was discovering something
about herself
and her barista.

I wanted to be close enough
to see her face.

In a second-hand shop,
still damp with effort,
I found a dress
and looked beautiful in it.

There was no occasion.
I bought it anyway.

Three flowers, each a different kind,
came home with me.

I ate a chicken drumstick
with my bare hands,
took my basketball from the couch
and went back out.

At the court,
I kept sending the ball
above my head.

For once, repetition
was something I had chosen.

My ankle ached.
I wanted another shot.

Later, salmon from a tin,
beetroot staining the bowl,
sesame seeds,
the dark pour of balsamic.

In the shower, a set Will sent,
“beautiful music for you”.

For me.
Water running down my back.

I put a little of the day online.
It pleased me
to recognise myself there.

Such a curious pastime,
this poison
I sometimes take without consequence.

Later, a work meeting
with a woman from Toronto.

She wanted me to curate her next event.
She also wanted to interview me
for her company’s editorial on metamorphosis,
asking how my life had changed
and how I had become who I am.

I was wearing the new dress.
It felt good
to have my work recognised,
to hear someone else name
what I had put into it.

Now there is beer and wine,
Steve Lacy and SZA in my ears,
and emails from two artists
who want to work with me.

How cool is that?

I let myself read them twice.

Josephine is coming to meet me.
She has something to tell me.
I hope she is okay.

I could keep writing down
each thing that happens,
but I am afraid of the moment
the day changes tense.

It is beautiful.
It was beautiful.

I know how much effort it takes
to be available for a day like this.
To feed myself,
to leave the apartment,
to call someone
and have something to say.

Sometimes I think
other people do these things
without having to persuade themselves.

I resent how hard I have to work
for what looks, from the outside,
like an ordinary Monday.

Still, the sink drains.
The flowers are in water.
My ankle aches.
There are people
who want to make things with me.

I want to say
today was a good day
without feeling
I have dared it to change.