Your father’s teeth on the end table. Your father’s teeth on the microwave. 

He takes them out where he’s been and puts them down. 

They don’t fit right, he says, lips tucked, his face sunken, suddenly, as he fidgets the dentures out and back in. 

As common as nail clippers, when you come over. As common as the remote control. A coffee mug. A box of tissues. A thing that is needed, picked up, put down, and returned to often. A thing that goes on end tables. A thing that is always in reach. 

*

What is in reach? What do you reach for? 

A baby? A bottle? 

Rocking, your eyes look across the room and land on a window, reach out the window, and catch a squirrel leaping, a leaf falling, a finch, an adjustment of leaves against wind. All of these things in their place, also reaching. 

The baby cries, and you reach for him. 

The baby reaches for you. 

Outside, a cloud separates, the sudden shift of shade into light.  

*

There are too many things, you tell your husband often. Too much stuff and nowhere for it to go.

Toys, you mean. And books. And mail. And clothes. 

If you could throw all but a few things away, then you could float. 

He doesn’t mind the mess. 

You are a thing within this house of toys and mess. 

A baby cries. A baby reaches for you. 

Somewhere, your father jumbles his teeth into his mouth, tries to chew.  

What am I supposed to do with this?  you ask, and hold up everything.

Hold on to it, someone says.

It is already floating away.