Socks

one sock was stuck under a shoe in the downstairs closet,
the mate was waiting to be found upstairs in a basket;
their separation was long enough that the upstairs sock faded
away in the sun while the downstairs sock stayed vividly alert
sitting next to a baited mouse trap all those months of waiting.
I'd rather bask in a woven bed of reeds from India in the sun
than in the darkness waiting for a mouse to approach, holding my
threads tightly so to appear impregnable to small teeth.
Eventually we were found and reunited, our cuffs stretched
around each other and tossed into a drawer, knowing that our
differences will be unnoticed in the morning fog of dressing,
she's too preoccupied to care about matching colors.