I am on day 13 of my period
getting our house ready
for sale. Our tenants left a freezer
full of ice cream. They left
mattresses, and a jewelry box
with nipple studs. They burned
a black candle in a white bathtub.
Did I mention I am on day 13
of my period?
Not my cycle—my period. I nursed
two of my children until their first year
yet my period returned
after only six months.
Our tenants left monitors, silverware, plates,
Nerf guns and darts. They left a blender,
a coffee maker, a four-slice toaster. A tent,
dressers, a five-pound bag of sugar.
Wooden hangers! To be that young! To try
on adulthood, decide it’s not you—
to leave it all behind.
Suzanne Frischkorn is the author of Fixed Star (JackLeg Press 2022), Whipsaw (forthcoming in 2024 from Anhinga Press), Girl on a Bridge and Lit Windowpane (both from MSRP), and five chapbooks. She is an editor at $ – Poetry Is Currency, and serves on the Terrain.org editorial board.