MILWAUKEE TRAVELOGUE

She folds her hands across her lap

and leans her head against the subway windows.

Recognizing the film playing

on the thin skin over her obsessive eyes.

It begins:

They catch an elevator;

rising and relocating. 

Watch them sit down into their velvet red thrones. 

She rubs her wrists and

hears the sounds her chest makes as it twists. 

Those ribs clawing themselves out

finding air outside her worn pages of skin.

Her throat walled itself up with dried crispy flowers

he picked with care and handed with callous intent.

And her mouth became a vase.

She knew, you do know that she knew.

Care slides down her legs like water from a shower.

Wrapping herself in personal newspapers

from last year.

Soaking your print, your loose language

with the affection she perspired.

Stop.

When she was turning those sentences;

They became a bed time story

and the national anthem and

everything holy

And then lies.

She holds up the context

as everlasting evidence.

Staying on the train

will only allow her to arrive at

known locations.

After all

boys often count to ten

and then stop.