Room With a View

The wind breathed fire, brushing invisible lounges of flame across her
face as she stood on the balcony and looked down at the highway.

The apartment was an expensive one, advertised especially for its
"beautiful view." In this case having a beautiful view meant it had a
very large window and a very large balcony that looked out over a busy
highway that led in and out of a busy city.

Her idea of a beautiful view would have involved trees and a lake and
maybe some mountains in the distance.

This was here though, and the apartment was nice.

She closed her eyes, turned her face toward the sun, let the dragon's
breath of summer blow across her sweaty brow, where it was almost
cool, almost a comfort.

"Well, what do you think?" the realtor said from behind her, in the bedroom.

"I hate the view." she said, then turned and walked back inside.

He was sitting on the edge of the bed, trying to slip his sensible
shoe on over his sensible brown sock. His toupee had come off and he
hadn't bothered to put it back on. The top of his bald head was red
from the exertion.

"And it smells like bad sex in here," she said. "Keep the panties. I
don't want them anymore."

She left him sitting there, his soft and pudgy face open in surprise
as she walked out of the apartment.

She took the stairs down, because no one ever took the stairs. Her
footsteps followed her down.

It was hot in here too. Hotter, because even the hot wind didn't
reach the inner caverns of the apartment building. There were no
small balconies with beautiful views of hurried commuters.

On the stairs that led from the 3rd floor to the second her sin caught
up with her.

He grabbed her arm, swung her around, screamed in her face. "You
bitch. You rotten, rotten bitch!" His eyes bulged out, his faced
turned an alarming shade of crimson. She could picture steam coming
out of his ears, his nose popping off like a pressure release valve.

She giggled.

He slapped her.

For a moment there was silence. They stared at each other, each
angry, aghast at what the other had done.

A door opened, closed. Footsteps approached.

"You left your hair in the bedroom" she told him, and turned her back again.

This time she made it outside without him and the dry heat wrapped its
arms around her like a willing lover, a sooting mother, a soul
cleansing sauna without the humidity.

She would cry later, while the children were doing their homework and
she cooked their supper. Her husband might would notice that the soup
was a little salty, but he wouldn't know why.

Eventually she would leave him.

"I looked at a very nice apartment," she would tell him. "I'm moving
out on Wednesday. I will do ever other week with the kids, if you
insist, but they better not mess up my place.

Yes, eventually she would leave him, when she finally found the perfect place.

Perhaps I'm using the wrong real estate agents, she thought. Maybe I
should use a woman next time.

Things Yet to Happen

She woke up and knew it hadn't happened yet.

That knowledge gave her no peace.

It would happen. It would happen that day. Nothing could stop it.

Nothing could change it. It was coming.

She could only wait.

She got out of bed and got dressed, smiled at her mother, kissed herfathers cheek when he went to work.

Then she went to school.

It still hadn't happened, but it was going to. Its future happening buzzed in her head until she thought she was going to go crazy.

For once she was glad to have been branded a freak, to be friendless.If she had friends she would be tempted to tell them.

Telling them woudln't change anything.

Then it happened.

She felt it when she happend. The buzzing in her head suddenly stopped. Her stomach dropped. Her heart screamed.

The secretary called her to the guidance counclers office at 10 after10 that morning.

"I'm sorry, Ivy." they told her. "It was an accident. A horribleaccident. No one could have seen it coming. Nothing could have stopped it."

"I know." she told them. "I know."

And she did know. She always knew, and it always happened.

Dirty Feather

I found a feather in the mud,
took it in and washed it up.
Stuck the feather in my hat,
would you have a look at that.

Birdie feather, bright and blue,
no more mud, as good a new.
Much like people that we know,
clean them up and they will glow.

High Beams

She sat where she was, looking down at her hands folded serenely on lap. She wasn’t looking ahead, but she could still see the high beams headed toward her. They were still distant.

"I can see you," she thought, "but you can’t see me."

It felt ironic to her. Her very invisibility to the world was what had brought her there.

The lights came closer.

She hummed a song.

A warm breeze stirred, making the dry dirt of the road beside the tracks dance in a dirt dirvish.

"I should feel something," she though.

She felt nothing at all.

The high beams were almost blinding now, even though she still couldn’t see them. The train blared its angry horn at her.

She waited for them.

So Sorry

I’m sorry I was not sad enough to please you.
I’ll try harder next time
to squeeze out crocodile tears.

I’m sorry if I did not mourn
the millions I did not know.
I must have an evil soul.

I’m sorry I am not happy
like you are happy
with the life I was dealt.

I’m sorry I put my own suffering
before I put the suffering of strangers
in must have a rotten mind.

I’m sorry I did not cry for them,
but not sorry that you will not cry for me
when I’m gone.