the slant a building settling around me my figure, female, framed crookedly in the threshold of the room door scraping floorboards with every opening carving a rough history of bedroom scenes the plot hard to follow the text obscured in the fields of sheets slowly gathering the stains of seasons spent lying there red and brown like leaves fallen the colors of an eternal cycle fading with the wash cycle and the rinse cycle again an unfamiliar smell like my name misspelled or misspoken a cycle broken the sound of them strong stalking talking about their prey like the way hammer meets nail pounding, they say pounding out the rhythms of attraction like a woman was a drum like a body was a weapon like there was something more they wanted than the journey like it was owed to them steel toed they walk and i'm wondering why this fear of men maybe it's because i'm hungry and like a baby i'm dependent on them to feed me i am a work in progress dressed in the fabric of a world unfolding offering me intricte patterns of questions rhythms that never come clean and strengths that you still haven't seen I'm calling from the diner the diner on the corner I ordered two coffees one is for you I was hoping you'd join me 'cause I ain't go no money and I really miss you I should mention that too yes I know what time it is in fact, I just checked I even know the date and the month and the year I know I haven't been sleeping and when I do I just dream of you dear I miss watching you drool on your pillow I miss watching you pull on your clothes I miss listening to you in the bathroom flushing the toilet blowing your nose I'm calling from the diner the diner on the corner I ordered two coffees one is for you the cups are so close the steam is rising in one stream how are you I think you're the least f**ed up person I've ever met and that may be as close to the real thing as I'm ever gonna get but my quarter's gonna run out now or so I'm told I guess I'd better go sit down and wait for you til my coffee gets cold