Leaving

tonight in this heatwave
the house is pressed back by silence

I have boxed up my life so that
others may impose their shapes

and dreams upon these blank walls
I have erased myself from its history

the house remembers with each creak
each child I carried up to bed

our rituals, the meals we had 
our safaris, on scooter and bike

to the shop, me following carefully
my nighttime prayers, like a rosary

we waited for the sky to break
through each heatwave and war

this heat seems fiercer somehow
the future more uncertain

already half of me has gone
my ghostly soul is in transit

I have boxed up my life
smoothed out each bump of memory