For the Skinhead Refinishing My Floors

By | 1 February 2019

Complete strangers in the same house, I wish you like me,
as I chat, you are silent, nose ring, tattoo of a crossed out yellow star.
The acrid scent of finishing burns between us, you see.

I mean everyone needs work and they have to have money,
maybe for some party memberships, but also for food, your kids, the busted car.
Complete strangers in the same house, I wish you like me.

I was raised to answer each burning bush, confront each difficulty;
support for the widow, orphan and you know, the stranger, no matter how bizarre,
the acrid scent of finishing burns between us, you see.

It’s ingrained in me, even if you’d orphan my kind without mercy
or so my fantasies run as together we lift and move a heavy bar,
complete strangers in the same house, I wish you like me.

I want to explain this floor is messed up because I cooked oily
Latke’s and also dancing with my husband in heels made these scars
the acrid scent of finishing burns between us, you see.

But you turn away and I feel history is harder to get out than blood or tea
as you mask your ringed nose and turn on your machines’ roar;
complete strangers in the same house, I wish you like me,
but the acrid scent of finishing burns between us, you see.

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