So he comes in, says he's got
what we need, hoses, couplings
all you want
to make this a home
sits on a crate in the middle
of no furniture no rugs
just a film of dust on everything
like incense or fallout
and out come his bags and brushes
out come the filters and wands
he throws dirt on the floor, scatters coins
tosses confetti in all the corners
says This is for the little woman
and flicks the switch and the sudden vast
intake of air is something we've never heard
the floor humming like an electric grid
everything unsightly sucked up
as if it had never been, cobwebs on the wall
dust on the photographs of great-aunts and -uncles
peering out from a desert of silence
breakages and spills undone grains of salt
shattered glass in the deepest crevices
The power of technology! he shouts
above the whirlwind of cleansing
skimming over the floor from wall to wall
every shred every obstacle removed
surfaces so unblemished that for days after
we can brush our fingers along the baseboards, sills
over the faces of every photograph
without making the slightest mark.