I tense my thumb over the bottom right-hand corner
of the page and recite a block of text
transcribed from a dead man’s notebook.
A stuttered requiem without accompaniment.
When I run out of lines to botch,
I bow my head politely and leave the stage
before anyone with a list of names and numbers
in front of them can thank me “for showing up.”
Outside, a woman dressed like a carnival growls at me,
or to me, in a language I don’t understand.
The audition sheet she grips prompts me
to point her in the right direction.
I watch her strut from my present to my past,
and neither of us is smiling.
Maybe she’s foreign to this place,
and maybe, so am I.
May 11, 2014
May 11, 2014 at 9:38 PM UTC
I tense my thumb over the bottom right-hand corner
of the page and recite a block of text
transcribed from a dead man’s notebook.
A stuttered requiem without accompaniment.
When I run out of lines to botch,
I bow my head politely and leave the stage
before anyone with a list of names and numbers
in front of them can thank me “for showing up.”
Outside, a woman dressed like a carnival growls at me,
or to me, in a language I don’t understand.
The audition sheet she grips prompts me
to point her in the right direction.
I watch her strut from my present to my past,
and neither of us is smiling.
Maybe she’s foreign to this place,
and maybe, so am I.
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