Tonight
I
whispered in Spanish
In
a stairwell.
Without
watch.
To an
audience of no one.
I whispered in Spanish.
Accents lithe
and spilling
down banister,
wrought and rubbed
down with hands
with ears
with
soles.
In the
basement the accents
met clandestine, huddling together
in the shadow
of the staircase.
Each word tumbled from step to next step
Uniformed
children came down a slide,
piling at the bottom.
At the bottom,
skirts were torn,
tanbark mauled the white.
A boy in the corner
watched them,
slurring in Spanish.
And it sounded
like peach skin
separating from the flesh,
pulling and cussing.
I whispered
about this.
