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Staring at channel 11-

footage of bomb dust flying

everywhere and bursts of orange.

buzzing of helicopters and tiny figures

making their exit.

And into the clouded mirror in front of her

at Darlene's Parlor.

"did you hear about so and so's daughter and that boy."

echoing in the background.

dizzying clouds of chemicals 

move around her head,

get caught in her throat.

nights of tv dinners,

sleeping in curlers-

their pins maddeningly

pushing into her scalp.

one afternoon she gets her husband's

rifle from under the bureau,

stands in the backyard

and shoots at birds as they fly by.

bed linens strung on the clothesline

whip in the wind

like little flags. 

Putting on her lipstick-

the bleeding scarlet paint of it

covers her mouth

and she watches them fall.

one after the other.

because he crossed the place where

endings begin and

noticed the tiny coils that accumulated on sidewalks

he was desperate for small things-

the way bits of gravel dust clung to balmy shins.

the void that overtook at night,

blank walls, empty parking lots.

a quiet comfort of sinking

into beer bottles and folded up into sheets for days.

and shopkeepers

that greeted, staring making him

self-conscious. 

the nothingness that made up 

distractions, the brush of a stranger's shoulder.

the darkness and how he blended into it,

an indiscernible figure.