The car, the cab, the train, the subway, shoes, escalator, hallway.
Two hours later, the whole thing in reverse,
making her way home across the electric night.
A shower brought her back
from where she had been going.
She stepped onto the faded mat,
squeezed her hair into the sink,
entered the dark bedroom.
The socket installed by a dying man
years before she was born,
the ragged cord, the brass lamp,
her damp fingers: Bare arms
(skeleton shrieking blue gray yellow white),
down the dripping leg to wet ankle,
the cold alloy bedframe.
She screamed, a choking sound
she could hardly hear, and fell
like a burning tree to the bed.
photograph by the divine Rachel K.
