Metallic taste in my mouth,
sand between my teeth.
Electric red heat
flows from my heart
to my shoulder blades
where razor-tipped wings push
beginning to sprout.
Tearing.
I walk almost
alone
past shops.
Their neon lights read
sweat, blood, and pride
sold here.
The face confronting mine
reads
"Give me your purse
bitch."
What did you expect
when globalization has been
white-
washed
across culture?
Tingling pain aches
in the base of my stomach.
Freezer-burned marbles
ingested one by
one
sharpened on my tongue
and spat back out.
A voice on the radio is far too
composed.
A partly cloudy evening with a high of
fifteen.
We go now to news of
self
importance, qualifications and credentials.
I cal home looking
for sympathy
and find instead an
argument
on modern society.
No, Mom,
I don't
think
it's a race
thing.
Bones sweat
tremble even.
A cold hand grips,
spreads like spiders' webs
and creeps like Jack Frost.
Newspapers are reporting
rising crime
in the area.
But, we don't have enough
information
to follow up
on your
case.
There are too many
in the area
that fit that
profile.
I want to laugh so hard
I cry.
Hot salt tears
acidic enough
to remove graffiti;
big black spattered
scars
that have laid claim
to my vitality.
I buttoned my coat sideways today.
A little like me,
sealed,
but the seams don't match.
I'm standing backwards on a bus
because there isn't enough room to
turn around.
Nor do I want to.
Because even if there was room,
if there weren't so many
people
headed to the same place I am.
And assuming I wanted to see where
I was going
instead of where I'd immediately been.
I have just plain to much baggage
to allow me to turn around.
Such a simple pivot is made amazingly
complicated
by the weight
of the words
that i carry in a beach bag
by my hip.
There are the planners,
and calendars,
the interesting bit of plastic I found
on the street this morning
that I thought might be useful
even though I can't imagine what for.
And there are the color-coded
red-green-blue
seven-forty-five-to-half-past-when
schedules.
That heap of organization
would tumble and bubble
pell-mell
from the bag by my hip
(that matches my jacket
and scarf
and the cuffs on my mittens
that no one can see anyway).
All of my right-angle efforts
neatly-filed papers
planners
and crisp-edged folders
risk being defiled
on the muddy-boot rivers
that run the length of the aisle.
All of it would explode
if I were to try
to turn around.
So I stand there
sandwiched like so much tuna
between a man I am sure showers
less often than I cut my hair
and a woman
wearing almost enough perfume
to cover him up.
I ponder all of this
and I decide
I'm fine.
In fact,
I am perfectly content
to watch the green light
on the back of the bus
inform me that it is now safe
to open the door.