Monday Night in the Church Basement

frayed edges
of your bulging backpack
remind me that the perimeter
of my world is larger than yours
on the street

we sit together
share a meal
a roof above

tell me the story
of your dead daughter
absent sons and eviction

read me your memoir
of life without work
or shelter, or meds

smudge the pencil-mark borders
erase the margins of difference
excise the space between us:
light-years of travel from
your birth home to mine

white-out my privilege
erase my margins of indifference.