Laundry

While logically consistent,
I cannot cotton a multiverse.
I must refuse a world
in which you never left home,
in which I never went home.
And I must refuse a world
in which your tires lost traction,
in which your hands and cool reflex failed
and you slammed a jack-knifed semi.
And the one in which we slept angry
for the first time and dissolved
in the morning.
Must I go on?

No, your coffee steams,
and you tend stains
on old shirts, lay them gentle
in the basket before
heading downstairs
with laundry on your hip.

Image: Devon Janse van Rensburg on Unsplash