every day she tokyo drifts up to me
with a peach
every day I say oh this is great!
that’s so thoughtful of you!

I don’t know what her voice sounds like
but I go home to bake
a peach pie for the fourth time
this week

through frosted glass
I glimpse her santa hat bobbing in the ocean
her doctor’s mask
vacuum-sealing her jack-o’-lanterned face

I scan the water for shark fins
until my fire alarm shrieks
at the perfume
of too-candied peach

a nauseating chill overcomes me
as I scrape my failure into the bin
but it is just her darting to the store
barefoot and icicling

she forgets to open the door the first time
and swings her net through the window instead
I wince at another alarm
that I should be used to

at dinnertime I climb the staircase to her doorstep
with a tarte tatin of last week’s apples
I want to ask how she affords all the things in her house
or her house

but I cannot find the right words
or the doorbell
and her lights spark and dim
before I can try again