I am a silence with eyes. Time reaches around my thoughts. I sit and think. Machines do our laundry while we wait, mentally bored with one thing at a time run against the sound of the machines: Machines will do that. Young women wait as well for one thing at a time. We see opportunities, in seeing, make-become reasons for stasis. If I had seen before, I would have known: Something to be used. The opportunities are processes with slots for dimes and quarters. I pour carbonated water down my throat until the can’s empty. Then I lick the metal.
July 1971