Thu, 25 December

Six place settings, one occupied. The water runs hot enough to redden the hands. A glass holds suds like a snow globe nobody shook. Outside, the neighbors' inflatable Santa keeps bowing in the wind— genuflecting, genuflecting— and the kitchen window fogs until the street disappears, until the whole block is just one pair of hands turning a plate slowly the way you'd turn a globe looking for a country you once heard someone describe but could never find.