Ode to a New Couch

You aren’t new

Not really

You have been loved before

And

I hope

You will love again

Your lenient planes cup our boy’s body

As he scales new terrain

I feared he could no longer perch himself on your arms

Rotisserie chicken style

But lo and behold

it’s beginning to smell like a deli in here

I stubbornly slept upon you

the night before last

Though the kitchen’s proximity

the cat’s clawed adventures

my husband’s early rise

all disturbed me

But it’s quite a thing

To find yourself in a context

where you prefer to be disturbed.

This is a poem I wrote during a residency with the Hundredth Hill in June of 2026.