To My Sister: Please Leave Our Room

You have my old tennis racquet,
sleep in my Bob Seger t-shirts.
There are light spots on the wallpaper
where two beards and a Beard were
smashed by Pumpkins.

I preferred a magic, gauzy coverlet from India
to your layer cake of quilt, blanket, sheet, second blanket.
What makes you so chilly?

Is it the hand that reached out
to lift away your layers?
Do old night demons still
bedevil you?

I'm sorry to have left you
moving on as I did to recline on
slick couches coming finally to rest on
my own mattress. I can even tear the tag.

I sleep now in a room of comfort.
Green-painted walls for serenity--
I applied every drop myself
to know each flaw in the surface.

Not alone, my man rests easy along side.
My dog sleeps with one eye open, so I never have to.
No one slips beneath my covers now--
just my cat, Zelda.
She must be chilly, like you.

Leave the room, kiddo. It's so bleak in there.
I can't come back and drag you out--
Oh, I would.
The demon is now long gone
no more need for the racquet.
You have outgrown those t-shirts.
Why do you stay?

I know someone
with a couch.