don't ask

Pierced

I pierced the man's shadow with the tip of my umbrella,
pulling apart my rubbery, chapped lips
to say excuse me. He didn’t turn.
I hadn’t spoken – a crow flew down
and ripped the words from my beak-like lips.
She cleaned out a Styrofoam container next
and spat my words on the ground by a crushed beer can.
Before he could get away, I left my shiny sharp friend
to her preening and copied his walk step for step,
flexing my hands, dry and scaly.
The turn through the revolving door was like sex,
when you both thrust the same direction.
We were connected for that moment,
our electricity passing through steel and glass –
mine shocking pink that moves straight for his groin
and his a hazy cornflower blue that slides off my shoulders,
pooling at my ankles.

Inside, I tell the desk guard he’s my brother,
that I’m fresh from a Greyhound
for a Columbus Day surprise.
He one-eyeballs me while stamping the guest badge
with the earth date, the one we all have to follow.
I press the adhesive slab below my belt –
“sell by date” I say and stare at his placid empty face.
I spend some time preparing in the women’s toilet --
meditating, chewing gum, changing socks.
Two girls enter talking low about an office enemy
and they freeze when they see me doing deep knee bends.
“Ladies, do you get enough calcium?” I ask them.

Written 2009. I really don't know what this is, except weird.