I sat down
and found myself
revealed,
scars exposed,
I saw every part of me
to the ingrown hairs on my legs
and the bright ink staining my skin,
parts permanent, parts transient.
Tributaries traced my veins
wandering for the greater good
as water grieved my existence,
lying heavy on my eyelashes, my hair,
streams rushing over my face
in a gasping confusion
--water, air
Water racing down my open body
trying to get away,
but I am still,
eyes burning from direct contact,
Toes curling from the cold air escaping in
from under the curtain.
I am old. I have aged suddenly,
wrinkled, stuck on the ground like
a tree planted decades ago
Maybe I will never have to leave this spot.
The creases in my fingers and the panic in my lungs
tell otherwise
by the disorient, the uncleanliness,
the infusion
of wet on wet
of hot on hot
of cold on hot
of thought on empty sound
of running water and streets
buzzing and bumping
and beeping
and foreign, distant
echoes of your voice
in my head
I do not know you
I do not know how you to got to be
or me, for that matter,
and I look at my bent legs,
hugged to my naked chest,
skin on skin,
I feel it,
and I cannot see it,
and you haunt me,
and I do not know
how showers
are cleansing.
