Bread and Bread

Our cat brought in a mouse today. I knew as soon as I heard her huntress meow, but I forgot until I plucked a sheet from the top of a laundry pile, and there it was: onyx-eyed, shell-eared, running for new cover. Except, not running, exactly. Pulling itself along on its front legs only, dragging its pink hind feet behind, the way our baby used to do before he learned to crawl. Except then he learned to crawl, and to walk, and he's nearly running now, whereas the mouse probably took a fang to the spinal cord and was on its way out.  I say "it" for clarity. I don't know the mouse's gender, and "they" seems precious in this context, or confusing. I'm thinking of all the things I do for my own comfort and clarity.  I caught the mouse twice; I have a system now, thanks to our cat's prolific haul. I thwap a tupperware container over the creature, then slide a magazine underneath. Sometimes it's The New Yorker. Sometimes it's the nonprofit punk

An old woman came to our door  selling potholders she’d woven, a little grubby from her grip,  the wear and tear of having offered herself  so often You bought two, added them to our drawer, saying, “That could be me.” My dad earned good money,  but your own mother had filled a drawer with unopened bills You’re twenty years gone and I’m pushing your grandson in his stroller when a woman on Figueroa holds out a stack of potholders, a prayer written in yarn No tengo dinero, I say, and it’s true, but a block too late I realize I could have gotten cash and found her again. I could have summoned you I dream of telling your other grandson that I’m dying, trying to be honest  while softening the blow, as if  such words could ever be anything but an earthquake That could be me: leaving them, joining you. To lack the audacity of confidence—in clear bloodwork, a steady paycheck—is to leave them anyway, my head perpetually turned Lo siento, lo siento, I say to her and you, and your grandsons,  th