The Landlord

The Landlord

He was a good tenant.
Rent was always on time.
I think a sister paid it — 
The checks were in her name.
And even when I found out that
He was keeping a cat —
You can’t get the stink out,
The place becomes, 
Within weeks, 
A place a cat has been —
I couldn’t bear to make him
Give her up, 
Much less evict him.

I know our reputation —
We’re all cold-hearted, 
Care only about money,
But some of us are decent.
I live here too, which is what
Makes this place feel more
Like one of those boarding houses in Balzac,
Places bachelors used to live
In my grandfather’s time. 

He was dead a good day
Before I heard the cat 
Meowing behind the door.
I opened it
And the cat flooded out
And pooled around my shins.
I called his name.
When he didn’t answer,
I knew.
I carried his cat
Like an armful of warm laundry 
Down to my place,
Opened a can of tuna,
On the sharp lid of which 
I’d find later
She cut her little face.

He was in bed, beard pointing towards his toes.
How terribly his arches were arched,
The tendons white-tight.
Drawing a bow across them
Would have raised a note.
His mouth was open like a man
About to sneeze.
I knew I should call someone,
But what was the rush?
I sat at his bedside,
Held his cold hand,
Dimly aware of the drawings
That completely covered the walls
And rose in teetering piles from the floor —
A fire hazard, what with all his smoking.
I have seen them since in the museum,
Perfectly framed and hung.
And I have seen his name, known only
To me, his sister, the men at the factory
Where he swept the floor clean
Of iron filings,
On the sides of buses, in brochures
I have magneted to my fridge
As if he were my very child.

The books he checked out and kept
Until they were long overdue
I returned for him, and when 
The librarian told me what he owed, 
I payed his fines.

His sad cutlery, intimate with his mouth,
I donated to Goodwill,
The forks and knives and spoons
Taped together, the price on the tape.

The apartment itself
I’ve kept as he left it.
Every few months I tell myself
I’m going to clean the place
So I can rent it out again,
But upon going in there
Something stops me,
As if some part of him is still there
And to clean it out would be
To evict him after all.

I’ve adopted the cat, of course.
Can’t imagine my life now without her.
She spends her days lying on the back of the couch,
Watching out the window the birds who alight
Upon the branches and power lines,
Her green eyes quick and bright
With a hunger that will never be sated. 
Sometimes I sense him in her.
Who’s to say that, 
At the moment of death,
His soul didn’t fly out of his mouth
And enter her lithe body,
A kind of afterlife.
Who’s to say that it isn’t him 
Whom I love?