You are poised with all the elegance of non-speech.
Shoulders tense, teeth clenched, fingers flicking
cigarette ash out the passenger side window.
Outside, the night exchanges words.
A window greets the wind with the screeching of its hinges,
the man on the intersection motions passage,
the trees bow their apologies, cars convene
in the perennial murmur of getting there.
Even the stoplights attempt words: perhaps warning,
perhaps accusation. The quarrel
of coins in a boy’s plastic cup
makes us uneasy, and we strain to hear
the city. Its temporary silences.
The rain announces its arrival on the rooftops
just to break the syntax.
You expel cigarette smoke from your lips
as you roll up your window.
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Jenina Ibanez is a III AB Literature-English student. This literary piece was previously published in Heights (2nd Regular Folio SY 2012-2013).
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