The black-and-white corridor smells
of the memory of cigarettes, parables
of ash caught above the coating of clorox. each step
documents the gaps where the wind and the noise
and the darkness seep through: light fixtures
installed off-center, the spaces where the windows
don’t quite fit. the staircase leans towards the
center, some countless odyssey of rises and
falls, forgetting marks of progress. this was once
a possibility of a home—the dizzying polar curl of tiles,
the twist of iron rails, a barely-covered dilapidation
pretending at elegance. but what seeps through the cracks
is a poison. the rot is crawling through
the floor. I remember that time I first saw
the madness of parallel mirrors, stopping suddenly
in the hallway, staring at the endless iterations
of myself curving into an infinity. the puzzle
of everything that could have been, had one
or two or two-thousand things gone differently.
even to this day I am still standing there, watching
the slight delay as some happier self steps out
of the frame.