by Rebecca Nguyen
I am a visual learner
so when I am sitting in the fold out chair, with my two buck chuck
and you are up at the mic
turning pages, swiping screens
the words are incomprehensible
I give up, I let them go
I let them hover above my head
(a sleepy mist, a sagging tarp, the northern lights)
or pool at my feet
(an unassuming puddle, a pile of dirt, a sticky soda spill)
I am mapping your brain waves
to see if they match with mine
I miss a poet because I am in the bathroom, coughing
but I fall in love with one boy
and the other, well, I want to lick him
there’s the girl who makes me shiver
the woman I want to slap
and the old man who is like the rest
except he has to sit
From them I hear, in no particular order:
- a hot, wet bed and lines of code
- alternating patterns of pink and blue
- the soft pad of a cat’s paw
- a knife and a frosted yellow cake
- white-capped waves of velvet
- a string of Christmas lights
- a New York city sidewalk and a potted plant
- breasts, perfume, something…more, I can’t remember
- where else are you allowed to stare and stare and stare
- where else can you see
- electricity all laid out like that