She wore a suit to the office and slicked her hair back.

The sun rose over her desk on the 12th floor each morning,

some mornings with her still at it from the night before,

way after the fireworks at Disney lit up the sky over the Matterhorn.

 

She often trembled and screamed in frightful hysteria,

whether in terror, rage, or frustrating fear, the office mates heard.

Until that day, when the mine went off, a planted time bomb,

and her head exploded inside a cage, inside the cement, inside–

 

When the four-wall howling ended and the gavel slam echoed

through a billion steps home, a fish tank then, she walked out.

And never looked back as the deputy screamed, “Get the fuck out!”

So she did and freed her bodily being, her mind not far behind.

 

She wears slippers and pajamas to work now, flexible hours,

and whispers, “thank you” to all she meets and all she doesn’t.

For all terrible storms, wind, fire, water, pour over the dead, or

soon-to-be-dead, until they learn to awaken and be, live and breathe.