It’s Sunday morning, about 8am. My BF Peter and I we’re doing our laundry. Most of the time, we spent in my dorm common room, sitting side by side on a red corduroy couch, while our clothes washed, and then tumbled away in the dryer. If you want privacy on a college campus, or to do laundry in peace, avoiding the weekend laundry rush, do it before 10am.

"Why do you wear these," Peter asked, pulling and lightly snapping the hair-band on my wrist.
I pull my hand back, protectively. "If I don’t have a hair-band on my wrist I feel out of control."

There’s a new me. I’d decided - civilized, unemotional, clear-sighted.
"I've got a lot to do before summer,” Peter said earlier, “so I made a spreadsheet.”

I felt a shadow pass over me - our future is, at best, undecided. So, I shifted gears, the way the new me is trying to do lately.
“A Spreadsheet!” I said, like I approved, and he grinned. I’d made him happy. This is what adults do, I’d decided, they have civilized conversations where decisions were made or avoided - but there was a small, dark thing in my heart.

I got a text from our dryer saying our clothes were dry, so we headed down. I love the smell of fresh laundry and the feeling of shaved legs against fresh bed sheets - a luxurious combination no guy will ever understand. I made a mental note to shave my legs later.

The last couple of weeks I’ve been working on summer fellowship applications. A successful summer fellowship is one of those things I’ll need when I apply for med-school - like grades, faculty letters, physician recommendations, community service, a great MCAT score, bla bla bla.

My mom knows the 200 things med-schools use to cleave away pretenders and she’ll rattle them off upon request and sometimes over groaning protests.

What I need, ideally, this summer, are clinical experience hours. There’s not much at stake, just my future, the respect of the faculty, and the begrudging acknowledgement of my pre-med peers. My mom was quizzing me on my progress last night. I confirmed that all the applications were in and I ended with, “I haven’t slept with anyone yet, to gain advantage - but we’re still early in the process.”

She was not amused.

Hymn to an Art-o-matic Laundromat
by Michael R. Burch

after Richard Thomas Moore’s “Hymn to an Automatic Washer”

O, terrible-immaculate
ALL-cleansing godly Laundromat,
where cleanliness is next to Art
—a bright Kinkade (bought at K-Mart),
a Persian rug (made in Taiwan),
a Royal Bonn Clock (time zone Guam)—
embrace my *** in cushioned vinyl,
erase all marks: ****, vaginal,
******, inkspot, red wine, dirt.
O, sterilize her skirt, my shirt,
my skidmarked briefs, her padded bra;
suds-away in your white maw
all filth, the day’s accumulation.
Make us pure by INUNDATION.

Published by The Oldie, where it was the winner of a poetry contest. This poem was inspired by the incongruence of discovering "works of art" while doing laundry at a laundromat with coin-operated washers and dryers. I was reminded of the experience while reading Richard Moore’s “Hymn to an Automatic Washer.” Keywords/Tags: hymn, art, America, Americana, laundry, laundromat, washer, dryer, appliances, clean, cleaning, cleanliness, clothes, clothing, underwear, god, godly, godliness, water, baptism, inundation, sonnet, analogy, humor

a filthy habit
drying in the sun / spotted
with little bits of nun

Aimlessly the wind blows carrying the cloth across the seasons,
Soiled was its surface that was cleansed with the nectar of redemption,
Clean is its slate that's used as we enter the new age,
A welcome opportunity of rebirth and renewal,
Draped on the line basking in warmth and rays,
It dries with promise of better days.

when i cradle your face in my dreams
tears slip over my knuckles
we both feel the miles between us like knives
playing on our veins like harp strings

but i wake up to haze and ***** laundry
no missed calls from you
besides, you told me the last time you cried
was when you finished that anime we don't talk about, anymore
so i keep my weeping between me and the moon
as i miss you harder than i clench my jaw at night

i wake up with my teeth aching
almost as much as my chest

Do you know what home feels like?
When I found you, I remembered 
I didn’t even know I had forgotten

Isn’t that funny? 

How everything you’ve ever wanted creeps in when you aren’t looking 

But I was always looking for family 
So when I found them 
It felt like I was dreaming 
Or maybe I finally felt like family too 
I sit up at night 
Studying both sides of my hands 
How much time did I lose? 
Was it a dream, after all?
I couldn’t have been asleep that long

Your breath still bathes the skin of my shoulders
Your hands still fumbles in my blankets 
I still feel you
I must have had too much to drink because when I woke you were just.. gone and I was on 
A stranger’s couch 
Kindness on the table cooked perfectly 
Every smile feels like The Truman Show, honestly 
Wait 
Wasn’t I just with my family? 
Don’t I have family? 
I was just thinking of my family 
Could you tell? 

Do I look like I need it? Can you tell I’ve been violently weeping in the wood? I’m some sort of ghost, will you take care of me? Have I skinned my knees? My palms sting. Did somebody say something when I was out because there’s a sheet of softener in here and everything is dry even though you have to hit the button every 20 minutes and I always forget to come back 

It’s sweet to know at least somebody’s mother is watching my clothes while I step out for air

You didn’t have to
I should say thank you 
I look around 
Last in, first out 
Not a scratch in my day but 
How long do you spend here? 
Cleaning all the clothes in the house 
My house is small 
So sometimes I let my basket build for weeks 
So I can stay a little longer
Flaunting XLs like I got somebody at home 

Oh, I hear him making dinner now
Throwing the pan across the room when I smash my finger putting away the cart, making a scene just to hear me laugh

He’s on his knees in seconds just to **** the blood from my knuckles and
                 Get this, 
He doesn’t even 
Spit it out

      He looks up smiling and says, 
“What would people think?” 

Now, the sight of blood makes me dizzy
But it isn’t the color 
I’ve always known how to clean up after myself but it feels
Harder now 
    To have less in my basket
    I’ll just take my time folding 
                                                Anyway, I like the lighting in here

Doing the household laundry is rather fun
The old roundy-go-thump washing machine
Roundy-go-thumps in time to the dishwasher
While the electric dryer waits patiently

Someday I will have a clothesline again
And summer days and summer sun will love
My shirts and towels so sweetly dry that they
Will want to fly away on the summer breeze

And when the clothes have been folded away
The sun will want to come inside to play

I just started a load of laundry
In hopes that it will wash away
The discomfort around expression
From my identity.
I imagine little people
As they run up and down
My pant legs
My shirt sleeves
My bra straps
Steadily scrubbing the internal
Abuse from the fabric.
They peel off the fine layers
Of self hatred and grime
Only to leave behind a shell
For my body to fill once more.

And, with no doubt,
I will climb from bed tomorrow
To don these scraps and
They will become one with me again.
My self doubt
and insecurities will
Stain my shirt pits
and my pant cuffs.
The devil raging inside me will,
More than likely,
***** my underwear
Leaving me in my own filth
Until I find time again
To do the laundry.