I was the open shirt
and the journal palm,
not a pair of wings,
the recorder of passersby.
They did not know what
to do with me. I strung
together metaphors while
they talked about baseball
cards. While they volleyed
juvenile experiences of lust,
I read the thoughts of
expatriate Parisians, sarcastic
polarizing prophets, and poems
balanced on an image. Popping
in compact discs, I imagined
the world I might one day
engage in, sketched in pencil.
