Is it still a proper brownstone
if it’s in Jersey? Six broad brick
steps open like arms, white concrete
banister a hand in open gesture.
Welcome. Unit B.

Does it matter if the details are wrong?
I tried.

Double doors slide apart, heavy as pianos
eyed in lead glass. The color is almost
cream. Almost yellow. Warped
wooden floors spread
hardened pulled caramel, pulled taffy.
The stained glass window stares onto the street
higher than anyone can reach. Cobalt and
cadmium red and yellow orange azo
in a perfect lead-lined circle twelve feet up.

Could it have worked? Us?

White and cobalt tile in the kitchen.
Plastic bat lowered on fishing line
spinning, facing an iron barred window. Two
squirrels stare in through more lead-lined glass.

How much lead was in that place?
How much lead in me?

Window half open onto the fire escape.
Twenty-four inches to save a life. Scrappy
orange striped tom comes and goes. Habanero
is his own cat. The fire escape
is for smoking and confrontation.

How is he? How is he?

Half a slanted closet waist high
is meant for liquor and board games. Some books.
Some sheets. Enough space to hide a grown man
like the crease of an overpass. Lead painted
wooden door. Lead paint flakes
off in layers. The door is more paint
than wood. More lead than wood.

I’m sweating the lead out. I’m sweating
you out. Lead beads on my brow and down my back.
I’m becoming clean again.