genius loci

Ghosts have a lot of competition, considering
that you can be haunted by almost anything.
Today: a word, genius loci, the pervading spirit
of a place, and the little fly
buzzing around my bathroom.

If my bathroom had a genius loci,
it would be the woman in the mirror—
if she is there, she is almost always
combing or pinning up her long hair,
eyes flicking between the strands
and the glass. She mimics me.
She washes her hands when I do,
splashes water on her face, scrubs.
This morning, she lunged up
and clapped, between her hands,
the soft dead body of a little fly.

Maybe she hates killing; maybe
I’ve made her a murderer
in her own mind, and she hates
silently through the glass. Maybe
she does not think of me
as real—maybe I am the spirit
in her bathroom mirror, only there
to comb and pin her hair, and then
gone, the both of us off to do
some other, beautiful thing.

We wash the fly off our hands.
We return to our hair, tucking the last
strand under the last pin. We look
at each other, no fly, no words, haunted only
by my own wondering eyes
looking back.